The Signal |The Education Wars: A Citizen’s Guide and Defense Manual, with Jennifer Berkshire and Jack Schneider

Jennifer Berkshire writes about the intersection of education and politics for the Nation, the New Republic, the New York Times, The Baffler, and other publications. 

Jack Schneider is the Dwight W. Allen Distinguished Professor at the UMass Amherst, where he leads the Beyond Test Scores Project. He is an award-winning scholar, and his work broadly explores the influence of history, culture, and rhetoric in education policy. 

Both Jennifer and Jack co-host the education policy podcast Have You Heard, and they co-authored A Wolf at the Schoolhouse Door: The Dismantling of Public Education and the Future of School which came out in 2020. Well, there’s good news, they have another book coming out in July: The Education Wars: A Citizen’s Guide and Defense Manual, which I was lucky enough to get an advanced copy of. They join me today to talk about this new book and why we must defend public education. 

Host Cyril Mychalejko’s 5 Book Recommendations to Further Shine a Light on Public Education in America

1. They Came for the Schools: One Town's Fight Over Race and Identity, and the New War for America's Classrooms, by Mike Hixenbaugh
2. Dark Money and the Politics of School Privatization, by Maurice Cunningham
3. The Death of Public School: How Conservatives Won the War Over Education in America, by Cara Fitzpatrick
4. Left Back: A Century of Battles over School Reform, by Diane Ravitch
5. Whose America?: Culture Wars in the Public Schools, by Jonathan Zimmerman

Also Listen To: 

• EPISODE 2 – The Merchants of Deception: The Dark Money and Front Groups Behind School Privatization, with Maurice Cunningham
• EPISODE 6 – The Right’s Long War On Public Education, With Jennifer Berkshire
• EPISODE 7 – Understanding Backlash Politics And Religious Conservatives Inciting School Board Wars, With PRRI’s Melissa Deckman
• EPISODE 10 – Raising A Transgender Child In An Increasingly Transphobic Country, With Brett Freeman
• EPISODE 11 – Unmasking Moms For Liberty’s Extremism, With Olivia Little And Diana Leygerman
• EPISODE 21- Understanding the Nation’s Mounting Book Banning Crisis in Public Schools, with PEN America’s Sabrina Baêta

Go see Jennifer and Jack live at the Philadelphia Free Library. Register HERE.

The Signal is produced by Kevin Mahoney, Raging Chicken Media.

Music by Maf é Tulà and Cartas a Felice, "La Loca." Panela Music. 

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