Product Overview
An inspiring new vision for America's public schools from one of the nation's top educators
American fourth graders score twelfth in the world in math skills, after Latvia and Hungary. Our eighth graders are fifteenth, below Malaysia and Slovakia. And by the time theyre fifteen years old, our students have slipped off the mapto twenty-fourth place internationally.
If these stats dont make you angry or ashamed or plain sad, then at the very least they should make you afraid. If matters dont change soon, tens of millions of our sons and daughters will grow up unable to functionlet alone competein a global economy. And the impact of that on all of us will be devastating.
All is not lost, though, says Rudy Crew, who has headed some of the largest and most daunting school systems in America. Not by any means.
Only Connect is a call for not just parents but the entire nation to reconceive our relationship with public education. If were to survive, we must place our schools at the center of our communities and partner with them to produce children with the full set of the tools theyll needpersonal, civic, and occupational as well as academicto face the economic challenges that lie ahead. Much like Thomas Friedman in The World Is Flat, Crew shows us the reality of our schools in a new century, and what we each must do to create the next generation of mature and conscious contributors to society. From parents who demand only the best from their children and their schools, through our teachers and administrators, all the way to Washington, D.C., everyone has a role in restoring American education and Americas competitive edge.
