FAYETTEVILLE, Ark.— University of Arkansas professor Jay P. Greene has released a book that examines and rejects some widely held beliefs about schools and education. In “Education Myths: What Special Interest Groups Want You to Believe about Our Schools - And Why It Isn’t So,” Greene addresses 18 underlying assumptions about education and finds that in the main they are not supported by research findings. His concluding chapter suggests another approach to improving the education system.

Reed Greenwood, dean of the UA College of Education and Health Professions, said, “In education, we have taken many things for granted, assuming that certain 'givens’ were based in scientific fact. In his research and publications, Dr. Greene has pointed out the gaps between what we believe and what the evidence shows.”

Greene researched and wrote “Education Myths” with Greg Foster and Marcus A. Winters while the three were affiliated with the Manhattan Institute’s Education Research Office. In summer 2005, Greene was appointed to the UA Endowed Chair in Education Reform and leads the new department of education reform at the University of Arkansas.

“It is important in education today to pay close attention to the need for hard scientific studies and to conducting research that can determine what works in educating our children,” Greenwood said. “We also recognize that education scholars have a responsibility to make the results of research available in formats the public can readily access and understand. Dr. Greene has done just that with his new book.”

In the introduction to “Education Myths,” Greene argues that the generally accepted myths “do real harm to our children” and “facilitate mediocrity and block progress.” The education myths, he writes, “cause us to misunderstand the nature of the problems in our schools, to continue engaging in practices that shortchange students, and to resist the adoption of effective reforms that would improve education.”

He groups the myths into four issue areas, involving resources, outcomes, accountability and choice. Among the myths related to resources, for example, he includes such ideas as “schools perform poorly because they need more money” and “small classes would produce big improvements.” For each of the 18 beliefs, Greene examines the available research and explains how the data refute the myths.

 

In the end, Greene concludes: “These myths have distorted virtually every area of education policy. Disentangling them from the education system and establishing policy based on facts supported by systematic evidence will be the work of at least a generation.”

He asks the question, “What approach to education policy is vindicated by the evidence?” and points out “the power of incentives to change behavior, and therefore to improve outcomes.”

“Against the education myths that dominate current policy,” Greene writes, “the importance of incentives is a scientifically established fact.”

“Education Myths” was published by Rowman & Littlefield and includes a foreword by James Q. Wilson, former president of the American Political Science Association and professor of public policy at Pepperdine University.