Patricia H. Hinchey is Penn State Professor Emerita of Education and a Fellow of the National Education Policy Center. She holds a doctorate from Teachers College, Columbia University, where she taught several graduate courses in secondary English education. In addition to teaching a wide variety of both undergraduate and graduate education courses at Penn State, she has conducted professional development for K-12 and university faculty nationally and internationally. She also served as director of a professional development unit serving university faculty at multiple campus locations. In addition to teacher education, professional development, and action research, her interests include the intersection of theory and classroom practice, a focus of this most recent work from Myers Education Press. She is as well the author or co-author of several well-known books and numerous articles.

At a moment when brawls are breaking out at school board meetings and state officials are increasingly issuing curricular mandates, it's possible that this text's central question is more important than ever: How is it that given good intentions and hard work among education professionals, things in schools can go so very wrong?

As in the first edition, Hinchey and Konkol suggest that unspoken and misleading assumptions can produce choices, decisions and policies with disastrous consequences for kids. They tease out such assumptions on the key issues of school goals, curriculum, education for citizenship, discipline and school reform, inviting readers to question the taken-for-granted in order to better align intentions and outcomes. Such contemporary issues as book banning and parents' movements are presented not as isolated controversies, but instead in their historical, cultural and political contexts.

Designed for both undergraduate and graduate classrooms, the text applies to a wide range of studies related to public education, including its theory, policy, history and politics. Without proselytizing, the text asks readers to think for themselves and articulate their own commitments guided by end-of-chapter questions, some intended for all readers and some specifically for experienced professionals. Suggested additional readings, websites and videos invite further exploration of the topics under discussion and offer still more food for thought.

Perfect for courses such as: Social Foundations of Education, Foundations of Education, Introduction to Education/Intro to Urban Education, Education Policy Foundations, Contemporary Issues in US Schools, Education Theory and Policy, Issues in Curriculum Education Studies, Social Issues and Education, and Education and Society