Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 370.973
EAN: 9780307405388
ISBN: 0307405389
Label: Crown Forum
Manufacturer: Crown Forum
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 224
Publication Date: August 19, 2008
Publisher: Crown Forum
Release Date: August 19, 2008
Sales Rank: 12717
Studio: Crown Forum

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Editorial Review:

Product Description:
With four simple truths as his framework, Charles Murray, the bestselling coauthor of The Bell Curve, sweeps away the hypocrisy, wishful thinking, and upside-down priorities that grip America’s educational establishment.

Ability varies. Children differ in their ability to learn academic material. Doing our best for every child requires, above all else, that we embrace that simplest of truths. America’s educational system does its best to ignore it.

Half of the children are below average. Many children cannot learn more than rudimentary reading and math. Real Education reviews what we know about the limits of what schools can do and the results of four decades of policies that require schools to divert huge resources to unattainable goals.

Too many people are going to college. Almost everyone should get training beyond high school, but the number of students who want, need, or can profit from four years of residential education at the college level is a fraction of the number of young people who are struggling to get a degree. We have set up a standard known as the BA, stripped it of its traditional content, and made it an artificial job qualification. Then we stigmatize everyone who doesn’t get one. For most of America’s young people, today’s college system is a punishing anachronism.

America’s future depends on how we educate the academically gifted. An elite already runs the country, whether we like it or not. Since everything we watch, hear, and read is produced by that elite, and since every business and government department is run by that elite, it is time to start thinking about the kind of education needed by the young people who will run the country. The task is not to give them more advanced technical training, but to give them an education that will make them into wiser adults; not to pamper them, but to hold their feet to the fire.

The good news is that change is not only possible but already happening. Real Education describes the technological and economic trends that are creating options for parents who want the right education for their children, teachers who want to be free to teach again, and young people who want to find something they love doing and learn how to do it well. These are the people for whom Real Education was written. It is they, not the politicians or the educational establishment, who will bring American schools back to reality.

Twenty-four years ago, Charles Murray’s Losing Ground changed the way the nation thought about welfare. Real Education is about to do the same thing for America’s schools.




Rating: - Covers The Basics Well
The amount of misrepresentation of Murray's views is staggering. People call him an elitist; yet the bulk of the book is devoted to showing how the current education system hurts the less gifted from all angles--especially financially--and detailing how it can help the less gifted more. Then he goes to rip apart the current American elite which, from Murray's account, are a bunch of greedy, foolish, selfish, ignorant, pretentious, and self-important crooks and liars who seem to possess no redeeming ... Read More

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Rating: - Real Education:Four Simple Truths for Bringinging Schools Back to Reality
In this book, Charels Murray reveals what we all know and no one really wants to discuss. The education system is broken and we continue to try to fit square pegs into round holes! He may create some controversy in his perspectives, but step back and engage in his thought process and you will see that he is spot on in his views. That should beg the question of what are we getting for the tax dollars invested in the education system.
This is a book that should be read by all educators, all elected ... Read More

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Rating: - "Not All It's Cracked Up to Be"
Charles Murray writes an awful lot in this book about how we can change the system to make it better, but what we really need is to be increasingly skeptical of one person claiming that they can "make it all better" if we just listen. I urge readers to read very critically and think of the results of not allowing more than the highest 20 percent to attend college. If we really allow Educational Testing Services to produce certification tests for everything instead of allowing people to receive a well-rounded ... Read More

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Rating: - Get to know the real Charles Murray
Murray is the author of the brilliant WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A LIBERTARIAN. Therefore, one might expect this succinct and fluid little book on education to be a critical analysis of centralized educational schemes coupled with recommendations for more privatization and healthy competition. There is a splash of this, as Murray makes his case against the backdrop of Title I and No Child Left Behind's disappointing results; but REAL EDUCATION is broad in its scope and full of pleasant surprises.

Sadly ... Read More

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Rating: - May seem radical in its approach, but its ideas are definitely worth considering
Education for all is one of the few things that most agree on, but to what extent? "Real Education: Four Simple Truths for Bringing America's Schools Back to Reality" is a call to revamping how America educates its children. Going on four principles that are bold enough to say that not everyone is going to be capable of becoming a rocket scientist or the next president, it calls for an education which is on level with the people who need it the most, America's academically gifted. "Real Education" may seem radical ... Read More

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