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The Core Knowledge Blog
Does TFA Dampen Civic Engagement?
by Robert PondiscioJanuary 4th, 2010
Critics joke that TFA stands for “Teach For Awhile.” But a new study suggests a more troubling and counterintuitive phenomenon. A Stanford University study shows TFA grads are less likely to vote, give to charity or be otherwise civically engaged than those who dropped out of the program, or those who were accepted into the program but declined the offer. Doug McAdam, a sociologist at Stanford University, says the reasons for the lower rates of civic involvement, include not only exhaustion and burnout, but also disillusionment with Teach for America’s approach to the issue of educational inequity, according to the New York Times.
The study, “Assessing the Long-Term Effects of Youth Service: The Puzzling Case of Teach for America,” is the first of its kind to explore what happens to participants after they leave the program. It was done at the suggestion of Wendy Kopp, Teach for America’s founder and president, who disagrees with the findings. Ms. Kopp had read an earlier study by Professor McAdam that found that participants in Freedom Summer — the 10 weeks in 1964 when civil rights advocates, many of them college students, went to Mississippi to register black voters — had become more politically active.
“While Teach for America graduates remain far more active than their peer group, the findings indicate that the program neither achieves an earlier organizational goal of ‘making citizens’ nor produces people who, in great numbers, take their civic commitments beyond the field of education,” writes the Times’ Amanda Fairbanks, herself a former TFAer.
“It’s hard to see the incredible outpouring of interest among this generation and think of it as a lack of civic engagement,” Kopp tells the Times. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem as if this study looked at Teach for America’s core mission, by evaluating whether we are producing more leaders who believe educational inequity is a solvable problem, who have a deep understanding of the causes and solutions, and who are taking steps to address it in fundamental and lasting ways.”
Baby-Sitters Club Set for Relaunch
by Robert PondiscioJanuary 4th, 2010
Madonna! Leggings! Big hair! Like these ’80s icons, The Baby-Sitters Club is gearing up for comeback. The juggernaut book series for preteen girls had a run of 213 titles and 176 million books sold from 1986 to 2000. The revamped series will skew slightly younger than its original audience of 8-12 year old girls. The New York Times reports Scholastic is bringing out a new “prequel” by Ann M. Martin, the original author of the series, titled “The Summer Before.” One bookseller quoted by the Times thinks the retooled series will sell “really well to the girls who aren’t quite ready for vampires and particularly to the parents of the girls who aren’t quite ready.”
The re-released books will be getting a minor facelift to bring references to technology and fashions up to date. A“cassette player” has become “headphones” and a “perm” has become “an expensive hairstyle,” the Times notes. That’s already led to some grumbling. “If the series really is a classic then wouldn’t changing the text so Claudia can receive phantom texts rather than phantom phone calls be considered sacrilegious?” wonders Margaret Hartmann at the blog Jezebel. ”As a child I appreciated The Secret Garden without Mary taking a jet to Mr. Craven’s ’80s bachelor pad.”
If Scholastic is looking for ideas to update the series, former teacher Maureen Miller has some suggestions at her new blog, McReeney’s Thing on the Internet, rendered in pitch-perfect Baby-Sitters Club jacket copy blurbs:
#1: Kristy’s Great Idea
Kristy thinks the Baby-Sitters Club is a great idea. She and her friends Claudia, Stacey, and Mary Anne all love taking care of kids. A club will give them the chance to have lots of laughs–and get them into an academically competitive preparatory school of their choice. But nobody counted on alerts, questions about vaccinations, wild sexts, and parents who don’t always E-mail back. Having a baby-sitters club is hard work, but Kristy and her friends aren’t giving up until they get into Choate!
#8: Boy-Crazy Stacey
Things are great in the Jersey Shore: There’s a housing bust knocking down the rent on the beach house, erosion, plenty of mid-priced chains and lot parking… and the hottest guy Stacey has ever seen! Mary Anne knows that The Sitch is way too old for Stacey, but Stacey’s in luv. She fends off guidettes, fetches him brewskis, and spends all her time with him… instead of the kids. Suddenly, Mary Anne’s doing the work of the day and night nannies working off their undergraduate debt while they pursue master’s degrees, and she doesn’t like it one bit. But how can she tell Stacey that The Sitch isn’t interested–without breaking Stacey’s pride?
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