Free-Market Think Tanks and the Marketing of Education Policy

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KEVIN G. WELNER but she’s all for it in the educational sector. Nicholas Kristof worries about a “hedge fund republic,” but joins in the hedge-fund “For about two years now, President Obama managers’ campaign to criticize teacher-union and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan have contracts. Jonathan Alter of Newsweek sees been co-opting much of the GOP playbook on dangers in unregulated markets yet pushes for education. They support charter schools. They more markets in education. As anyone who endorse merit pay. They decry teacher tenure has watched Waiting for Superman can attest, and seniority. On alternating Thursdays, they Alter is particularly hostile toward teachers’ bracingly challenge the teachers’ unions.” So unions. Director Davis Guggenheim is another begins a December 2010 article in National example: a hero of the Left for An Inconvenient Review Online , authored by Frederick M. Hess Truth , but a hero of the Right for Superman . of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and Media stars such as John Legend and Oprah Michael Petrilli of the Fordham Institute. Winfrey have also joined in, as have (to some Later in the article, Duncan receives praise extent) venerable civil rights organizations from these conservative pundits for embracing such as the United Negro College Fund and spending limitations on American schools and the National Council of La Raza. welcoming—in place of those resources— The most engaged in this neoliberal “productivity” increases. education campaign are organizations focused The Duncan-Obama approach should on school choice: Democrats for Education sound familiar, even to those who do not Reform (and their 501(c)(4), Education follow education policy discussions. Defund, Reform Now Advocacy), Education Sector, deregulate, de-unionize, and shift to the and the Progressive Policy Institute; as well as private sector. Reallocate policy-making service-oriented groups like New Leaders for authority from democratic institutions to a New Schools, the Knowledge Is Power wealthy oligarchy. Corporate-endowed think Program (KIPP) and Green Dot charter tanks like AEI have been successfully networks, Teach for America, The New promoting this road map for everything else, Teacher Project, Stand for Children, the New so why not education? Schools Venture Fund, and even the lead - But education is different in one disqui - ership of the Harlem Children’s Zone. eting way: many self-identified progressives These groups, it should be stressed, are have climbed on board the bandwagon. Some, very careful to avoid being characterized as in fact, are driving. Although the economic politically on the Right or affiliated with analyses offered by groups like the Brookings Republican political efforts. Their collabo - Institution and the Center for American rators, however, do not show any such reluc - Progress generally explore how to soften the tance. Right-wing, free-market think tanks sharp edges of market capitalism, their have joined with neoliberal education groups respective education divisions are busily in pushing for choice and privatization promoting free-market policies in our policies. These right-wing think tanks and children’s schools. Arianna Huffington warns similar organizations are active in every state, against deregulation of the financial sector, and many more are pursuing a national

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agenda. Together, these groups have launched for school choice as well as support for a a potent attack on the progressive foundations broad portfolio of anti-union, deregulation, of American schooling, and they are framing and privatization endeavors. What BAEO and this attack as a “civil rights struggle.” similar organizations do is help to make the After years of hammering home the theme public face of school choice more attractive to of “failing public schools,” the campaign is progressives than the movement of decades now increasingly focused on teachers’ unions ago, which was dominated by transparently and the existing system of teacher education, anti-public-school activists. preparation, and certification. Deregulation is This points to what should be the funda - consistently put forward as the best way to mental progressive response—the critique that address unmet needs. Additional attacks are many progressives seem hesitant to seize: that leveled at legal and political efforts toward an educational opportunities should be among equitable distribution of educational resources the most precious public goods. While public and at democratically elected school boards education does provide an important private and neighborhood schooling. Offered in their benefit to children and their families, it also place are school choice, mayoral control, and lies at the center of our societal well-being. free-market entrepreneurialism. Under the Educational opportunities should therefore new model, accountability and sound policy never be distributed by market forces, because making are found not in traditional demo - markets exist to create inequalities—they cratic structures but in a fundamentalist view thrive by creating “winners” and “losers.” of the power of the market as exerted through These forces are already at play in the housing parental choice. Efficiency and quality are to market, and school reform should attenuate be achieved through choice combined with the resulting inequities, not exacerbate them, publicized test scores. as we see happening with unconstrained By any measure, the free-market campaign school choice. in education has shown extraordinary results. Reformers appeal to the urgency of Conservative education policy is now confronting “failing schools,” but the logic of pervasive and deeply ingrained among a their argument leads inevitably to students’ growing faction of powerful and wealthy dependence upon parents who know how to Democrats. As suggested by the opening maneuver within the system to gain private quotation from Hess and Petrilli, education advantage. This is an abandonment of the goal has emerged as a key potential area of accord of a comprehensive public sector that provides between the White House and the equitable, universal opportunities. Such Republican-led House. Only minimal consequences are anathema to progressives compromise will be necessary because the two when free-market ideas are applied to health sets of positions are already so well-aligned. care; there is no reason they should be Of course, most people and organizations welcome when applied to the education of the on the Left are justifiably disgusted by the nation’s children. lack of progress the nation has made toward providing equitable educational opportunities for children of color and those living in The shift to the current focus on deregulation poverty. And when confronted with repeated and free-market solutions was not a mere disappointments, it is not surprising that happenstance. A great deal of time, money, many people are willing to grab onto and effort orchestrated the shift in a very attractive-sounding alternatives. Small purposeful, calculated way. As an example, wonder that some progressives find them - consider the case of Linda Darling-Hammond. selves drawn to an organization such as the During his presidential campaign, Black Alliance for Educational Options. BAEO candidate Obama assembled what he called a was started in 2000 with funding from the “team of rivals” (evoking Abraham Lincoln) Walton Family Foundation and the Lynde and for his education advisers. The team was Harry Bradley Foundation—two philan - primarily composed of neoliberals, but among thropies that have offered enormous support those leading the team was someone with a

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progressive perspective—Stanford professor most respected research journals. This should Linda Darling-Hammond. She is widely be a matter of concern. If all documents recognized as one of the most accomplished labeled “research” are indiscriminately and respected scholars in the field, and teacher received and reported as of equal worth, preparation and teacher quality are her without review or critique by independent particular areas of expertise. experts, their value is obviously not Immediately after the election, Obama dependent on quality or rigor. These attributes announced that Darling-Hammond would are beside the point. Value is instead tightly head his transition team for education, and linked to the ability of the researchers to gain speculation was strong that she was the front- attention and influence policy. Private think runner to become secretary of education. What tanks, which produce their own in-house, followed in November and December of 2008 non-refereed research, accordingly become were repeated condemnations of Darling- sensible investments for individuals and Hammond—in the Washington Post , the New groups hoping to advance their agendas. York Times, Newsweek , and the New Republic , In January of each year, the Think Twice among others—with the unremitting charge project hands out its Bunkum Awards, high - that she was a defender of the status quo and lighting nonsensical, confusing, and disin - an enemy of reform. David Brooks’s negative genuous education think tank reports from the assessment, he wrote, was preceded by “a past year. Only those reports judged to have flurry of phone calls from reform leaders most egregiously undermined informed nervous that Obama was about to side against discussion and sound policymaking are recog - them” by choosing Darling-Hammond as nized. Past winners include the “Time education secretary. Her primary crime, in Machine Award” given to a report from the their view, was the publication of a research Reason Foundation. In a truly breathtaking article in 2005 titled “Does Teacher innovation, the report attributed positive Preparation Matter?” which was skeptical of reform outcomes to policy changes that had dazzling claims made by and about Teach for not been made yet. Another winner was the America. In the end, the media and political Manhattan Institute, which received the “Who campaign against Darling-Hammond was both Reads Warning Labels? Award” for its report ferocious and successful. arguing that teachers are better paid than most white-collar professionals. The study used hourly earnings data to support its In part, the success of the campaign reflects contentions. But, our reviewer noted, “This the rise of private advocacy think tanks, approach is fundamentally flawed because the whose “research” has helped legitimate the [data set’s] calculation of weeks and hours conservative educational agenda. I have worked is very different for teachers and other learned a lot since I helped to start the Think professionals. In fact, the Bureau of Labor Tank Review Project (thinktankreview.org) Statistics—which publishes the [data set]— five years ago. The project—now called Think has explicitly warned its users not to use Twice—applies academic peer review stan - hourly rates of pay in this exact same context.” dards to reports from think tanks and then An attack on preschool policies by the publishes reviews on the project website. Hoover Institution won the “Misdirection” Think tank reports have become widely influ - Award for its courageous effort to keep policy ential for policymakers and the media. Their makers from noticing approaches that actually influence is due not to the superiority of their work to help children. Rather than acknowl - research but rather to the think tanks’ profi - edging a mountain of empirical, peer- ciency at packaging and marketing their reviewed, and widely accepted evidence, the publications—many of which are of very weak Hoover author cherry-picks a few weak quality. We have found that these advocacy studies to criticize proposals for universal reports have often attained greater prominence preschool. Our reviewer summed up this than the most rigorously reviewed articles work as “errors, exaggerations, misrepresen - addressing the same issues published in the tation, and logical inconsistency.” Among the

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reviewer’s catalog of fourteen major errors, he conclude that the public nature of public notes that actual costs are exaggerated by a education is the root cause of all that ails factor of two while immediate and long-term schools—everything else is a symptom. well-documented effects are underreported or not reported accurately. This tactic—the selective use of earlier Just a few decades ago, the Think Twice research to bolster what appear to be pre- project would have had much less work to do. determined findings—is one we have seen Public policy think tanks began fairly repeatedly. Other harmful patterns and prac - modestly with the founding of such institu - tices that are pervasive in the publications of tions as the Brookings Institution (1927), the advocacy think tanks include methodological American Enterprise Institute (1943), and the weaknesses, such as failure to account for Hoover Institution (1959). In the 1970s, a selection bias or the confusion of correlation number of influential think tanks such as the and causation, failure to provide the data on Heritage Foundation (1973) and the Cato which the report’s findings are based, over - Institute (1977) were founded, and since the stated conclusions, and unsupported recom - 1970s the number of think tanks has increased mendations based on improbable inferential dramatically. The most active and powerful leaps. tend to be free-market think tanks like those Just this January, we published a review mentioned above. To date, the Think Twice by economist Jesse Rothstein of the University project has published more than eighty of California, Berkeley, who examined a reviews, and they highlight a well-financed, December 2010 report from the Gates tightly interconnected group of policy actors Foundation. The report had been trumpeted in working within a growing alliance of free- newspapers and other media outlets across the market organizations. country as proof of the validity and usefulness In addition to national organizations, a very of value-added models, which are used to visible and influential network of state-level estimate students’ likely achievement in a free-market think tanks has been built, in - given year. The report used student test scores cluding the Pioneer Institute in Massachu - to gauge teacher effectiveness—a confirmation setts, the Mackinac Center in Michigan, the of a policy supported by the foundation. But Buckeye Institute in Ohio, and the Common - Rothstein found that the study’s own data wealth Foundation in Pennsylvania. They “undermine rather than validate value-added have induced major shifts in the nature of pol - based approaches to teacher evaluation.” As icy discussions. While university-based schol - presented in the Gates report, the study ars produce the most research, publications of purportedly showed that teachers whose private think tanks are disproportionately rep - students show gains on the state test also resented in the reporting of major national produce gains on a separate test of deeper newspapers. Market-oriented think tanks in conceptual understanding, administered by particular have proliferated, buoyed by very the researchers. Rothstein’s review, however, large gifts from a relatively small number of explained that these correlations are very benefactors. For instance, between 1985 and weak—that over 40 percent of those teachers 2000, three staunchly right-wing funders—the whose students’ state exam scores place them Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, the in the bottom quarter of effectiveness are in Sarah Scaife Foundation (controlled by bil - the top half on the alternative assessment. lionaire newspaper publisher Richard Mellon In report after report from market-oriented Scaife), and the John M. Olin Foundation— organizations, privatization reforms in awarded grants of more than $100 million to particular have been offered as the pre- just fifteen market-oriented think tanks. Fur - ordained solution for any number of educa - ther funding was provided by these founda - tional problems, from school funding to high tions to other think tanks, and additional fun - school dropout rates to the weaknesses of the ders have also supported the network. No Child Left Behind law. Indeed, a person With funding from right-wing donors, reading these reports could not fail to market-oriented think tanks have been able to

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engage in aggressive outreach to media and Changing this dynamic requires finding a policy makers to promote their favored ideas. way to limit the sway of power and money Conservative donors have demonstrated a over school reform. Redressing the imbalance greater willingness than progressives to spend between the influence of vulnerable commu - their money on developing and supporting nities impacted by school reform and that of institutions that adhere to their ideological billionaires convinced that they know what is premises—and to fund activities that directly best for those communities demands learning engage with the political process. By contrast, from the methods of the Scaifes, Olins, and most non-conservative grantmakers tend to others. Just as there are no quick fixes to the support community-based projects that crises—educational and otherwise—facing address urgent needs and to shy away from America’s low-income communities of color, politics. Further, few progressive foundations there are no quick fixes to these participatory are willing to fund the operating expenses of and political inequalities. To bring voices from institutions with strong communication vulnerable communities to the fore will strategies and clear public policy goals. It is require new networks of progressive not surprising, then, that institutions funded educators, families, organizers, researchers, by conservatives produce a much greater level advocates, and policy makers as well as bene - of activity aimed directly at influencing policy, factors willing to invest heavily and for the such as the publication of research reports, long term in research, implementation, and briefing documents, legislative analyses, and communication—to engage with the politics commentaries, as well as networking and as well as the substance of education. briefings for policy makers and reporters. The pattern, seen cumulatively over the Kevin G. Welner is professor of education and director of the past several decades, is that the Right has National Education Policy Center (NEPC), housed at the focused tremendous resources on marketing University of Colorado at Boulder School of Education. His its ideas and building networks of powerful research examines the use of research in policymaking, the allies that will push those ideas; the Left has intersection between education rights litigation and educa - not. As a result, the messages promoted by tional opportunity scholarship, and the school change conservative think tanks have influenced even process associated with equity-focused reform efforts. His progressives who otherwise bring to bear a latest book, co-edited with William Mathis, is The Obama healthy skepticism regarding market-based Education Blueprint: Researchers Examine the Evidence . proposals for solving problems of social inequality.

Welcome Aboard We are very happy to welcome two new members of the Dissent editorial board.

Mark Engler , who blogs regularly for Dis - Gary Gerstle is a historian of the twenti - sent and has written frequently for the eth-century United States, a professor at print edition, is freelance journalist and a Vanderbilt University, and the author, co- senior analyst with Foreign Policy in author, or co-editor of six books. His Focus. He is the author of How to Rule American Crucible: Race and Nation in the World: The Coming Battle Over the the Twentieth Century won the 2001 Sa - Global Economy , a monthly columnist for loutos Prize for outstanding work in immi - the Oxford, UK-based New International - gration and ethnic history. He is at work ist magazine, and a regular contributor to on an interpretive history of national and a variety of progressive magazines. He state government power in the United has lived in Guatemala and El Salvador States from the time of the Revolution and has reported from throughout much until the present and has written several of Latin America. times for Dissent .

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