Four short video conversations (embedded below) bring the voices of Dr. John Jackson and Dr. Diane Ravitch to explore serious concerns raised in a Pastoral Letter by the National Council of Churches Governing Board about today’s federal public education policy. 

We also provide a Study Guide to help you explore important questions.  

·         What is the impact of poverty on educational opportunity?

·         How can the church help ensure opportunity to learn for all children?

·         Why the attacks on school teachers and on schools as community institutions?

Download the study guide here.

See a news story about the webisodes here.

Video 1: Educational Opportunity for All — John Jackson, President and CEO of the Schott Foundation, and education historian Diane Ravitch discuss why our society must rise to the challenge of providing educational opportunity for every child in public schools. 

Video 2: Public Schools and the Common Good — Education historian Diane Ravitch and John Jackson, President and CEO of the Schott Foundation consider what appears to be a timetable for the destruction of America’s system of public education and the imposition of competitive programs that create winners and losers, when the mission of public schools is to serve every child.

Video 3: Public Schools, Part of the Community or Marketplace? — Education historian Diane Ravitch and John Jackson, President and CEO of the Schott Foundation, reflect on the public role of public schools as an expression of our common purpose. How is it we have come to use a data driven approach to judge the most important things in life, things that do not have metrics like the love of learning?

Video 4: Supporting Our Teachers — John Jackson, President and CEO of the Schott Foundation, and education historian Diane Ravitch reflect together on how our society has come to demonize public school teachers. How is it that we have people doing some of the most important work of society being abused, ashamed and humiliated? Why does this have to stop?