Common Sense Education

From Common Core to ESSA and Beyond

By (author) Ernest J. Zarra III PhD

Not available to order

Publication date:

16 August 2016

Length of book:

194 pages

Publisher

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

ISBN-13: 9781475825121

The 2015 passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) has again changed education for public schools and communities. Common Core is now optional and the role of Secretary of Education has been limited by no longer incentivizing states, as done under Common Core. This book analyzes the new direction today’s schools must pursue for student learning and their success beyond high school. States and local educational agencies are once again empowered and will have more authority over curriculum and assessment. Common Sense Education includes samples from these states, ideas from several universities which are retooling their teacher education programs and focusing on teacher excellence, as well as schools recalibrating their programs for student learning. This book advocates for common sense education, uses a national survey to provide parent and teacher perspectives, and suggests a new paradigm for exciting twenty-first century high schools.

List of Tables
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1: Why Replace Common Core?
Chapter 2: The ESSA: The Direction of Twenty-First Century American Education
Chapter 3: The Right Direction for Today’s Schools
Chapter 4: Twenty-First Century Teacher Excellence
Chapter 5: Twenty-First Century Teacher Preparation
Chapter 6: Twenty-First Century Schools
Chapter 7: Graduating Twenty-First Century Students
Endnotes
About the Author

Dr. Ernest Zarra's book, Common Sense Education: From Common Core to ESSA and Beyond is an insightful tool, and one by which to take our nation's students and its schools into the twenty-first century. Education paradigms change national direction far too often, argues Zarra. These changes affect students and their families. This enforces the belief the American education system has always been the graveyard of innovative ideas. Dr. Zarra questions whether these changes have been sensible, and surveys parents and education professionals, asking them to weigh in on this sensibility, as well as the current state and direction of education in America. The latest education fad to come along is the Every Student Succeeds Act. As a reaction to Common Core and its diminishing popularity, Zarra delves deeply into whether the ESSA, and its implications, is the right direction for our schools and students. But Zarra goes beyond this in his book. He provides a masterful critique, in terms of what teacher-training institutions should be doing to produce excellent teachers for twenty-first century classrooms, and what excellent classroom learning should look like. He also suggests ways to improve secondary schools and the education provided to students, to prepare students for college and career, as well as lay out a suggested framework for an exciting, highly inclusive secondary school program. I highly recommend this book and commend Dr. Zarra for taking on these twenty-first century critical education issues, and offering an innovative set of educational approaches.