The conceit of American exceptionalism is built on a rickety architecture of myths; myths that often overlap with messy truths. Consider George Washington's apocryphal confession “I cannot tell a lie” or the sanitized Hollywood versions of how the West was “won.” Or better yet, read Noliwe Rooks’ op ...more

This is a sweeping account of the various means by which hypocrisy, inefficiency, and greed have impacted our current wave of “educational reform,” and continued a legacy of inadequate public education for Black Americans. Through observations of alternative certification programs like Teach for Ame ...more

I’m mad. I think I’m supposed to be mad. I think Rooks wants me to be mad. How could you not be after reading a book that traces the entire history of inequality in public schools starting in the 1800s and winds up in much the same place in the 2000s?

Using her portmanteau “segrenomics,” Rooks discu ...more

This book, in many ways, does the critical work for K-12 education that Michelle Alexander does for the criminal justice system. Rooks traces the history of "school choice" to its origins in the rise of segregation and shows how the United States has a consistent history of taking public dollars awa ...more

wow! it is dangerous to assign me books for my courses because i literally have a final this week that i have not studied for because i spent all my time just reading and vibing with this book instead.

This book is about the privatization of the education "industry," and how entrepreneurs take advant ...more

3.5 stars

The road necessarily traveled to achieve freedom and equality in the United States leads directly through public education

Noliwe Rooks provides a well-researched look into the fallacy of equal opportunity in public education in the United States, arguing that the current move toward privat ...more

Comprehensive historical look at segregated public education and the philanthropic moves to better underfunded public schools. Well-researched account of presently failing strategies. I heard the author on NPR and wish she had been as argumentative in the book as she was on air. ...more

This book was phenomenal. It gives a thorough and detailed account of the history of the privatization of public schools in the United States. ...more

I read this book because I was asked "What is the last book you have read by a black woman?" and realized it had been two years.

This book is strong when it comes to giving you a deeper background on the history of black education in the US, the history of Teach for America, and the various modern at ...more

My partner had read this book previously, and I decided to read it after hearing Rooks on a podcast (Radical Bureaucrat). Rooks has written a book that is smart, critical, and accessible. I think it has supplanted Dale Russakoff's "The Prize" as the first book I would recommend to any general-intere ...more

Noliwe Rooks confronts the real reasons charter schools were invented, to resegregate public schools and turn the schools of minorities into profit making centers. It’s poor school districts which are being closed and the tax money of those citizens being used to make profits for the wealthy. Standa ...more

Another hard-to-read book because of its harsh and painful reality. The author, an age contemporary, was experiencing segregation/integration's intersection about 50 miles north of my own experience. As an educator, I appreciate how this book describes the gross inequality of our current public scho ...more

Oof... alright, here's my take on this thoroughly researched and smoothly presented work:

Basically we all know about Brown v Board of education and Ruby Bridges and school desegregation. We are taught these things as problems in our history that we have overcome as we towards a more perfect union.. ...more

I read Cutting School for a class I'm teaching called Schools and Poverty.

Wowza. This is one of the best books I have read on education policy. Rooks integrates economics, educational history and policy (i.e. "segrenomics") to document how the education system perpetuates inequality, advances profi ...more

I THOUGHT I understood the American school system. This book is not the first to take a look at the intersection of class, race and education but it may well be the best. Noliwe Rooks is brilliant. Full stop. What she has created here takes her in depth research and her assessment of the current and ...more