I found myself reading yet another strict charter school puff piece today

[conuly]

Every one of them tries to make the claim that the way to get poor minority students to behave and do well in school is to "reject victimhood" and be super strict.

If you ever find yourself reading one of these articles, keep these two questions in mind:

1. How do the results from these students compare from students who applied to this school but didn't get in?
2. What percentage of admitted students leave, are expelled, or are counseled out prior to their actual last year of school?

I guarantee, these questions will never be answered in the article you're reading. There is, in fact, a reason for that - and yet, people still keep writing them, which I guess means other people keep accepting them uncritically.

Comments

[conuly]

It seems like basic fact-checking to me. Do they just not do that?

[gwydion]

I think a lot of people aren't up on education issues and charter school/voucher advocates talk a good game and the reporters don't fact check because they'd need to know they were being zoomed and know to look for things like meta studies. It's faster and easier to just believe them, so ordinary people with no kids who don't teach don't know.

[conuly]

It’s bare minimum critical thinking! If it sounds like they’re trying to sell you something, they probably are, so you’d better double check.