Awards

• Winner of Outstanding Academic Title 2023

Overview

The Malfunction of US Education Policy: Elite Misinformation, Disinformation, and Selfishness biased and inefficient information dissemination that has degraded US education research and policy since the year 2001, when a series of unfortunate disruptions began: first, the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act and federal imposition of an idiosyncratic and ineffectual testing program; second, the “big bang” reorganization of the US education testing industry from a stable, cooperative oligopoly run by psychometricians to a commercially competitive free-for-all with more opportunist and customer-pleasing ambitions; and third, the Common Core standards, which mandated homogenous lower content standards onto the still required NCLB testing structure. Billions from the federal government and wealthy foundations have transformed many once-independent national education organizations into “cargo cult” dependents and promoters of the new order, intolerant of divergent points of view. The research and policy brain trust responsible comprised an alliance of convenience among two “citation cartels” of establishment and reform scholars and politicos, and an astonishingly cooperative and un-skeptical group of journalists. It succeeded in focusing attention on their work, while diverting attention away from a much larger universe of others’ work (by ignoring, dismissing, or demeaning it) that included a century’s worth of mostly experimental scholarship in the fields of psychology and program evaluation.

Full Product Details

9781475869934

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Reviews

"Do not be deceived by the title of this book into thinking that it should only be of interest to those focused on education policy. It is a clear-eyed analysis of how bad incentives, well-intentioned defense of free speech, and scholarly cartels are a recipe for a toxic brew of misinformation. Phelps' book is a must-read for anyone concerned with how we engage in the Sisyphean task of growing closer to the truth—and that should be all of us. -- Ivan Oransky, Editor in Chief, Spectrum; Co-Founder, Retraction Watch I am delighted to see that Richard Phelps has written this particularly well-supported and thoughtful assessment of relatively recent national education reform efforts and the paucity of objective evidence of their, in the language of medicine, efficacy and toxicity. No one has a better demonstrated record writing about and giving voice to knowledgeable early critics of some of these efforts that never seem to be willing to allow anything but fawning praise until they are replaced with the next shiny object. Well studied traditional assessments of educational progress of students are dismissed as being inappropriate for these new and improved innovations. Regrettably, education writers are not nearly as knowledgeable nor as critical as their role should imply. Their work almost appears to have been written by the reformers themselves as opposed to objective neutral observers. -- Wayne Bishop, Professor of Mathematics, California State University Los Angeles As a college professor, I've seen the long-term effects of the dominance of certain flawed education policies on the poor preparedness of students by the time they reach college. Why? The ability of a person or groups of people, they are academics, but I won't call them scholars, to promote themselves and their ideas to the suppression of contrary but important works are behind our failing system of public K-12 education. Dr. Phelps, a distinguished expert in the field of standardized testing, clearly and persuasively reveals how the effective obliteration of contrary and essential scholarly work by ""education cartels"" has brought us to a dangerous point in American education. This book serves as a wake-up call to scholars, policy makers, and parents. -- Therese Ann Markow, PhD, Professor Emeritus, University of California San Diego Richard Phelps’ latest publication (The Malfunction of U.S. Education Policy) addresses a badly needed topic—testing, or as is the actual thrust of much current education policy writing, anti-testing. Phelps’ book explains why the social sciences in particular do not provide a sturdy foundation for much if not most education policy today. Readers may find the claim that “no previous research” on important details exists. Thus, society and science are impoverished if not damaged by a truncated process for specific education policies that may reflect laziness or excessive reliance on one academic “celebrity” or publication. -- Sandra Stotsky, professor emerita, University of Arkansas"

Author Information

Richard P. Phelps is founder of the muck-raking Nonpartisan Education Group, and editor and co-author of Correcting Fallacies about Educational and Psychological Testing (American Psychological Association) and Defending Standardized Testing (Psychology Press). He holds degrees from Washington and Harvard Universities, and a PhD in Public Policy Analysis from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School.

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