ABSTRACT
Self-proclaimed realists looking to business for guidance similarly substitute clichés and slogans for serious science. The urge to apply “hard-headed” business practices to schools seems irrepressible. Hope springs eternal and the next “business-like” teacher-proof nostrum from the 1960s and 1970s was for-profit performance contracting. Technologically-minded reformers who look to business for inspiration rarely notice that academic performance has gone nowhere or declined as the marketplace grows ever more wondrous. A particularly revealing business-like reform from the 1980s into the 90s was Outcomes Based Education. Applying “sound” business principles to public education hardly ends with 1960-ish systems analysis and similar shortcuts. Beliefs that “business-style” pay-only-for-good-outcomes policies can work wonders are, apparently, irrepressible. Setting clear goals and then holding educators responsible with a mixture of carrots and sticks, is one of the most pervasive themes in the “business” approach to educational reform.
