Social Reform

Theodore Sizer, the founder of The Coalition of Essential Schools, was a passionate advocate for the American school system. In this, his last audiobook, he offers a vision of what a future secondary education might look like.

COVID. Climate change. Refugee resettlement. Global supply chains. We're facing a new generation of complex problems, stretching across the public and private sectors. Historically we've looked to government for big solutions, but the reality is, the government we have now is a poor match for the problems we face. We need a fresh new approach. As William D. Eggers and Donald F. Kettl show in this indispensable book, we need a government of bridgebuilders—public managers and leaders who collaborate with partners, both inside and outside government, to get the job done.

Grounded in extensive research and reporting, Spy Schools reveals how academia has emerged as a frontline in the global spy game. In a knowledge-based economy, universities are repositories of valuable information and research, where brilliant minds of all nationalities mingle freely with few questions asked. Intelligence agencies have always recruited bright undergraduates, but now, in an era when espionage increasingly requires specialized scientific or technological expertise, they're wooing higher-level academics.

This book contains the fundamental works of Marxism, Anarchism and Bolshevism: The Communist Manifesto, originally the Manifesto of the Communist Party, by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels; Reform or Revolution by Rosa Luxemburg; The Conquest of Bread by the Russian anarcho-communist Peter Kropotkin; Anarchism: What it Really Stands For by Emma Goldman; The State and Revolution by Vladimir Lenin; Fascism: What It Is and How To Fight It by Leon Trotsky.

In What's the Point of College?, historian Johann N. Neem offers a new way to think about the major questions facing higher education today, from online education to disruptive innovation to how students really learn. As commentators, reformers, and policymakers call for dramatic change and new educational models, this collection of lucid essays asks us to pause and take stock. What is a college education supposed to be? What kinds of institutions and practices will best help us get there? And which virtues must colleges and universities cultivate to sustain their desired ends?

Exploring the full sweep of federalism from the founding to today, Kettl focuses on pivotal moments when power has shifted between state and national governments - from the violent rebalancing of the Civil War, when the nation almost split in two, to the era of civil rights a century later, when there was apparent agreement that inequality was a threat to liberty and the federal government should set policies for states to enact. Despite this consensus, inequality between states has only deepened since that moment.

Why have so many middle-class Americans encountered so much financial trouble? In this classic analysis of hard-pressed families, the authors discover that financial stability for many middle-class Americans is all too fragile. The authors consider the changing cultural and economic factors that threaten financial security and what they imply for the future vitality of the middle class. A new preface examines the persistent and new threats that have emerged since the original publication.

As the 2020 presidential campaign begins to take shape, there is widespread distrust of the fairness and accuracy of American elections. In this timely and accessible book, Richard L. Hasen uses riveting stories illustrating four factors increasing the mistrust. Voter suppression has escalated as a Republican tool aimed to depress turnout of likely Democratic voters, fueling suspicion. Pockets of incompetence in election administration, often in large cities controlled by Democrats, have created an opening to claims of unfairness.

In contrast to the anxiety surrounding our voting system, with stories about voter suppression and manipulation, there are actually quite a few positive initiatives toward voting rights reform. Professor Joshua A. Douglas, an expert on our electoral system, examines these encouraging developments in this inspiring book about how regular Americans are working to take back their democracy, one community at a time.

The huge prison buildup of the past four decades has few defenders, yet reforms to reduce the numbers of those incarcerated have been remarkably modest. Meanwhile, an ever-widening carceral state has sprouted in the shadows, extending its reach far beyond the prison gate. It sunders families and communities and reworks conceptions of democracy, rights, and citizenship - posing a formidable political and social challenge. In Caught, Marie Gottschalk examines why the carceral state remains so tenacious in the United States.

Our current system of higher education dates to the period from 1865 to 1925, when the nation's new universities created grades and departments, majors and minors, in an attempt to prepare young people for a world transformed by the telegraph and the Model T. As Cathy Davidson argues in The New Education, this approach to education is wholly unsuited to the era of the gig economy.

Safe Is Not Enough illustrates how educators can support the positive development of LGBTQ students in a comprehensive way so as to create truly inclusive school communities. Using examples from classrooms, schools, and districts across the country, Michael Sadowski identifies emerging practices such as creating an LGBTQ-inclusive curriculum; fostering a whole-school climate that is supportive of LGBTQ students; providing adults who can act as mentors and role models; and initiating effective family and community outreach programs.

From one of the largest organizations of public school principals, this book exposes many misguided school-reform initiatives that are negatively impacting students and educators across the country, and recommends ways to make them more effective. Veteran educator Gerald Tirozzi addresses all the hottest school reform trends including: charter schools, teacher merit pay, Race to the Top, Common Core State Standards, and more.

Tony Little is the headmaster of Eton. One of the most progressive and imaginative people in British education today, he has hitherto kept a low profile. This title, published to coincide with his retirement, sets out his educational fundamentals. There is a crisis in the British education system. Year on year, GCSE and A Level pupils post better exam results, with more students achieving top grades. Yet business leaders and employers complain bitterly that our schools are not producing people fit for purpose.

In this short, searing book, Auster traces centuries of America’s use and abuse of guns, through the colonial prehistory of the Republic, armed conflict against the native population, the forced enslavement of millions, and the mass shootings that dominate the current news cycle. He examines the embattled gun-control and anti-gun-control camps, frames gun violence as a public health issue, and investigates the details of one horrific incident including the perpetrator’s unchecked purchase of the gun he used and the suffering of a bystander-turned-hero.

In 2020, while the COVID-19 pandemic raged, the US was hit by a ripple of political discontent the likes of which had not been seen since the 1960s. The spark was the viral video of the horrific police murder of an unarmed Black man. The killing of George Floyd galvanized a nation already reeling from COVID and a toxic political cycle. Tens of thousands poured into the streets to protest. The entire country suddenly seemed to be roaring for change in one voice. Then nothing much happened. Fredrik deBoer explores why these passionate movements failed and how they could succeed in the future.

People are looking for a better way. Towering barriers are holding millions of people back, and the institutions that should help everyone rise are not doing the job. Crumbling communities. One-size fits all education. Businesses that rig the economy. Public policy that stifles opportunity and emboldens the extremes. As a result, this country is quickly heading toward a two-tiered society.

Gilly wouldn't call herself wicked, exactly... but when you have five little brothers and sisters and live in a run-down boot, you have to get creative to make ends meet. Gilly's a pretty good thief (if she does say so herself). Until she gets caught.

With Mental Health, Inc., award-winning investigative journalist Art Levine delivers a Shock Doctrine-style exposé of the failures of our out-of-control, profits-driven mental health system, with a special emphasis on the failures of the pharmaceuticals industry, including the treatment of children with antipsychotics and disastrous PTSD protocols for veterans.

The evil Rumplestiltskin is planning to cast a curse that will erase Enchantasia as the world knows it, and a fairy prophecy declares that Gilly Cobbler will play a key role. Never likely to shy away from adventure, Gilly and her friends embark on an epic swashbuckling journey to stop Stiltskin from getting the ingredients he needs before it's too late. Gilly can't help but wonder if it's already too late for her beloved sister, Anna, who is still a member of the villainous Stiltskin Squad and will seemingly stop at nothing to thwart Gilly and her crew.