The Power of Their Ideas: Lessons for America from a Small School in Harlem - Softcover

Meier, Deborah

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0807031119 ISBN 13: 9780807031117

Publisher: Beacon Press, 1999

Synopsis

An innovative educator and leader of one of the most remarkable schools in the country--Central Park East--offers her ideas for public education and tells why she thinks good education is possible for all children. 40,000 first printing. Tour.

About this title

Review

The founder and principal of excellent small schools in East Harlem . . . Meier wants to make all students capable of participating in and sustaining a democracy. . . . Doubters must read Deborah Meier to take a look at that success up close, to watch it begin and grow and flourish. --Lorene Cary, The New York Times Book Review

"Meier pledges her faith 'in the extraordinary untapped capacities of all our children'; but, unlike so many radical reformers, she is also firmly rooted in the reality of the classroom. . . .What has propelled people like Meier from the periphery to the center of the ongoing school debate is the recognition that a new and different form of public school is no longer a luxury." --James Traub, The New Yorker

"Written in prose that runs like a clear stream past the sludge of educational discourse. . . .The fate of public education today depends on whether we listen to . . . the Deborah Meiers of the land." --Joseph Featherstone, The Nation

"A fiery manifesto of Meier's plan for the salvation of public education." --Los Angeles Times

"A book not of blueprints and slogans, but of essays-reflective and analytical. The Power of Their Ideas is the product of a lively mind." --The Washington Post

"Anyone who wants to get insight into the current waves of endless 'reform' debate should read it." --Philadelphia Inquirer

"Meier documents her 30 years in schools. . . . She has captured the national imagination in a way that few public school teachers do." --Muriel Cohen, The Boston Globe

"Destined to change the way we think about teaching and learning, schooling and education." --William Ayers, Rethinking Schools

From the Publisher

More praise for "The Power of Their Ideas"
"'The Power of Their Ideas'...is required reading for anyone interested in what's wrong with our schools and how to fix them."--Dutchess

"The statistics speak for themselves: In a city where the high school graduation rate is 50 percent, 90 percent of the students in an East Harlem, NY, school graduate and 90 percent go on to attend college. Deborah Meier, the founder of the school Central Park East, tells how she did it in her new book."--Creative Classroom

"This book is a valuable addition to the developing literature on effective school reform."--Commonweal

Edition details

• Publisher: Beacon Press
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0807031119
• ISBN 13: 9780807031117
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 190