On Susan Wise Bauer's Rethinking School

Plough Quarterly has quickly become one of my favorite publications, and I’m honored that they have featured my review of Susan Wise Bauer’s Rethinking School in their Winter 2019 issue. In general, I think Wise Bauer raises important questions about the efficacy of public education, but her critique misses the mark, and I’d like to talk a little bit more about that in this post. Do read my review first, as I won't rehash it here.

Wise Bauer sees only one alternative to public schools—homeschooling. Why? If she really wants to “rethink” school, why not consider things like Montessori, Classical, or Charter schools? After all, these types of schools have boomed in recent years, especially in East Coast metropolitan areas, where parents have the means to avoid the many pitfalls of their town schools. As I point out in the review, the recent explosion of these alternatives is due in large part to the success of Wise Bauer’s The Well-Trained Mind, written two decades ago, which introduced (and masterfully explained) classical education to a modern audience. Wouldn’t focusing on them in some way vindicate the author by showing how that “rethinking” of education has played out in recent years?

She chooses not to engage them at any level, though, and I couldn't help but wonder how much her stake in selling homeschooling materials affected this decision. The Well-Trained Mind, now in its fourth edition, has grown into a brand, with a website that that offers resources and, for a price, curricular materials for parents to use at home. Quite frequently, in the pages of Rethinking School, Wise Bauer refers readers there for further research. She also includes a large amount of testimonials from parents who have struggled with the K-12 system and have put her Well-Trained Mind advice into practice.

There’s nothing wrong with drawing on her professional expertise to make her argument, of course, but after the letters start to pile up (there are 90, by my count, in 227 pages) one gets the sneaking suspicion that the author has taken up the current educational obsessions of the Acela corridor as a way to rebrand her homeschooling product for a new, well-heeled audience. Especially in the second-half of the book, I got the sense that I was being sold something, as every few pages Wise Bauer includes a letter from another parent whose experience validated everything her website explains.

This is unfortunate, as her critique of public education is an important one and she is an authority on the alternatives to it. Rather than use her book to work towards a solution that benefits all, however, she mixes her argument with marketing, and the book suffers as a result.

Do read my entire review, which is more positive than this post, and check out Plough’s great publication.