I: Beginning the journey: thinking about our thinking
1. Starting points: assumptions and alternatives
Why theory and philosophy matter: from the abstract to the practical
Developing a personal stance
Historical possibilities: traditional goals
An alternative agenda: critical goals
The why and how of praxis
2. Understanding our own thinking: developing critical consciousness
Issues of race
Issues of gender and sexual orientation
The complexity of cultural conditioning
3. Expanding our thinking: Learning about "other people's children"
Who are America's schoolchildren?
Poverty, race, and schoolchildren
Other people's children: educational history and legacies
Other people's children: current realities
II: Considering destinations: truth, consequences, and the critical vision
4. In the interest of everyone but kids: the politics of contemporary educational reform
Themes in national political rhetoric
Theme 1: Education as workforce preparation
Theme 2: Education is failing
Rhetoric and realities
Why produce a "manufactured crisis"?
Corporations on the crisis bandwagon
Corporation in the schoolhouse
Staging for twenty-first-century reforms
5. Consequences of contemporary educational reform: winners and losers
Standards and high-stakes testing
The winners
The losers
Moves toward privatization
The winners
the losers
6. Critical alternatives for schools and teachers
Critical alternatives: redefining democracy and democratic goals
Critical alternatives: schooling for participative citizenship
Education as critical inquiry for social change
Education in service to the many
Critical alternatives: teachers pursuing social justice
Teachers who understand social power arrangements
Teachers who respect the other
Teachers as public intellectuals
Teachers as risk-takers
Parting thoughts
Information and allies for the critical educator.