Acquire A Chance To Make History: What Works And What Doesnt In Providing An Excellent Education For All Depicted By Wendy Kopp Edition

Chance to Make History” is, of course, written by Wendy Kopp, the founder of Teach For America and so it nicely encapsulates and delivers all of her experience with what seems to work in American education.
Its like taking a long walk with Wendy to get her thoughts on TFA and education, And so the book is a good read for teachers, PTA members, or education policy wonks,

However, I am neither of those though I certainly have had my moments when I consider dropping everything to go teach and so my interest in education policy and practice is a good bit more intellectual.
If this describes you, this is a good book anyway, and here's why:

In the education debates, a lot of silver bullet Answers are thrown around technology, smaller class size, “break up the teacher unions,” “throw more money at it,” etcetera and "A Chance to Make History" debunks the silver bullets.
Wendy Kopp makes are pretty airtight case that an “all of the above” approach is the only thing that works, She breaks down education into its constituent parts, clarifies the objective transforming kids lives and setting them on a great path for life success, and shows how each part can be optimized, localized, and made to be mutuallyreinforcing.


This kind of “break it down and put it back together” approach really appeals to me, I love understanding complex systems through their parts, And it gives me the confidence, when I hear a Silver Bullet advocated, to think, “Yeah, thats just part of the answer, ”

Its a really solid book, not too wonkish, and not too sentimental either,

P. S. A couple other things come through loud and clear:Great teachers are the most important part of this complete breakfast, andSchools should be optimized for the needs of the kids, not the adults which, alas, happens most of the time.

TFA's practice of identifying bright, active young people, training them for a very short period of time, and then sending them into the country's worst i, e. struggling schools is either a brilliant bit of public policy, or disasters waiting to happen, Fact of the matter is that kids learn better when they have a teacher who wants to be there and TFA only places people usually postcollege kids, but occasionally midcareer/ or retirees in school districts where no one else wants to teach.
A good way to burn out potentially good teachers, but if the point is to impact as many kids as quickly and as meaningfully as possible, then it is at least someone trying to do something.
The location of a child's school should not determine their future course in life schools everywhere should be able to graduate everyone with the ability to read and do simple math, and understand concepts of the world at large.


Idealistic, yes Achievable, TBD But someone has to do something, Definitely good information but not totally the kind of information I feel like I need when I'm getting ready to start teaching, I want to read more about HOW to teach, not about the systemic approach to ending the achievement gap, But if you're looking for a book on that latter subject, this is a great pick! Princeton graduate decides to start a program where college graduates all majors go teach in innercity schools foryears.
She says this will help the teacher shortage, giving kids a better education insinuates that the current staff cannot, So she uses her family/friends/school connections to raise,million dollars, just to START the program, She did this at a time when corporations were focusing on schooling and donating for the cause, so that helped her cause, But if she did not come from the background that she did, she wouldn't have raised even a fraction of the money,
I thought it was offensive that the author says that anyone can make a difference when she made her difference through her connections, Most people could not get meetings with CEO's of big companies like Stanley Morgan, and later companies like Apple, And I think the program is condescending to the school systems because it's saying the current school can't do anything to help themselves maybe the millions, up on millions this group raised could have gone to better use.
It is also my opinion that her program took jobs from actual teachers that needed their jobs, The teachers the program provided came in at or below starting salaries, pushing out teachers that "cost" more, I don't like it when people think

so highly of themselves that they have to write a book about it, This isn't a business model or even inspirational it's a memoir and a bad one,
I feel that this book was very informative about the problems around education today, I was disappointed that it seemed that her solution was to create more Teach for America recruits, because I don't think that makes sense from a policy perspective, and because I feel that it glosses over some of the bigger issues, like teacher retention.


However, this book is very readable, and a good introduction into the policy issues facing the American education system today, It's disheartening to realize how uneducated our society is about what it takes to educate children, especially when we spend a large amount of money and resources trying to accomplish this.
If everyone would read this book, especially those involved in education, but also the rest of us who elect school boards and pay for public education through taxes, I think the state of education in this country would start to change for the better.
I read this book as part of my preinstitute work as aTFA corps member, I know opinions about TFA are super polarized, and as a newcomer to the organization I am working hard to tip toe carefully among all those opinions I don't know enough yet to say what is true.
What I do know is that, personally, I'm not trying to use underserved children or communities as a stepping stone in my career in law or business or medicine as is often a criticism of TFA corps members.
I don't have a clear vision for my own future, but tentatively I think that I would like to stay at the school I'm placed at for at least five years if I feel that I am useful to the community and that from there I may want to get involved in education administration to try to effect broad positive change in the system.
I am not working under the assumption that as a first year teacher I will be a better teacher than those who have decades of experience in fact, I'm pretty sure that at first I won't even be a good teacher at all.
But I do know that my constant presence in the classroom will be better for my students than a string of long term substitutes, which is what TFA is meant to replace not veteran teachers.
I will strive every day to be the kind of transformational teacher that Wendy Kopp describes in this book,

That being said, this was an interesting book to read, I think she makes a case for a kind of broad scale, no excuses education reform that doesn't rely on any one "silver bullet" as she calls it not even TFA.
I found myself throughout wondering what SPECIFICALLY makes a "transformational teacher," but I'm sure that that is explained in more detail in Teaching As Leadership, the other TFA preinstitute book, which I am beginning now.


This book served as my March nonfiction challenge book, Through a collection of compelling case studies and proof points, Wendy Kopp outlines a convincing formula for giving children from disadvantaged communities an excellent education, While her book focuses on firsthand observations from her time at Teach For America, the lessons are applicable and the outcomes repeatable across the world, This book emphasizes the allaround excellence necessary if we're going to get serious about educating all children, A lot of the book covered material I was familiar with, but I still appreciated the anecdotes and even more the sense of optimism and possibility, And it was fun to have a "where are they now" section about the cast of Relentless Pursuit, a book I enjoyed, .