Sweating the small stuff

The Weekly Standard recently reviewed this book; a great read for anybody interested in seeing what actually works. The book also explains why we see more of what doesn't work instead of what does work...

The three legs of the education establishment tripod--teacher unions, education schools, and the district bureaucracy--are all unlikely to embrace key elements that make paternalistic schools work. Requiring teachers to work longer days and years would violate union contracts. So would allowing principals to handpick teachers (who may or may not be certified), evaluate and pay instructors based on their effectiveness, and fire those who are not successful in the classroom. Frequent testing, teacher-directed instruction, and flunking students who fail to meet academic standards are all unpopular at schools of education. District bureaucrats, meanwhile, are loath to grant individual schools the freedom to do things differently.