Martin L. Gross has made a career out of books that attack "the establishment," whether it be the medical community (The Doctors) or the general powers that be (The Government Racket). In The Conspiracy of Ignorance, he takes aim at a lumbering, elephant-sized target: public education. Armed with statistics and research papers--the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) being his most prominent sources--Gross rails against the declining performance of U.S. students. While his criticisms--which encompass everything from teachers' unions to "useless" education degrees, PTAs, psychological services in schools, even honor roll bumper stickers--are not new, they make an imposing indictment when presented all together.

Problems becaus they make no attempt to challnge the Education Establishment's control.In a powerful Bill of Indictment,Mr.Gross shows how the teaching vocation,aided by its unions,maintains a self-perpetuating cycle of low performance,and he offers his own detailed prescription for change that will raise public education to the level our chidren-and society-need and deserve.

The Conspiracy of Ignorance asks- and answers--the questions educators are afraid to ask. This book is desperately needed if American schoolchildren are to prosper in today's competitive world.

Martin L Gross is the New York Time bestselling author of The Government Racket,A Call for Revolution,and The Tax Racket,as well as The End of Sanity,The Brain Watchers,The Doctors,and The Psychological Society.He is the recipient of the NEA's School Bell Award,and has been a faculty member of the New School for Social Research and an adjunct associate professor of Social Science at New York University.He lives and works in Connecticut.

1 An Indictment of the Education Establishment

The Decline of Teaching and Learning

2 A Tale of American Student Failure

Domestic Ignorance and International Embarrassment

3 The Making of a Modern Teacher

Weak Selection and a“Mickey Mouse”Education

4 The Debased Reading Curriculum

Whatever Happened to Phonics?

5 Licensing and Certification of Teachers

A Nationwide Sham

6 The Ddbased General Curriculum

Whatever Happened to Geography and Trigonometry?

7 The Psychologized Classroom

Counseling,Personality Testing,and Dr.Freud

8 Private,Parochial,and Charter Schools

Superior Education and a Matter of Choice

9 Alternate Certification of Teachers

Competition from a Brighter“Untrained”Cadre

10 Middle School and High School

11 The Teachers' Unions

12 The Establishment and the Community

Conclusion

Endnotes and Bibliography

Index