The Chalkboard has had an unwritten policy of not posting about Thomas Friedman's best-seller "The World Is Flat." It's just a personal thing and I admit I'm probably wrong in my reasoning. As much sense as his arguments about competing in the global marketplace make to me, I've always been far more compelled by arguments for radical school reform that are rooted in racial and economic equity, and for the disastrous effects an extremely weak public school system will have on our ability to maintain a healthy democracy.

But this story in Sunday's Rochester Democrat and Chronicle is amazing, even if the best part is buried a bit down in the story. The thrust of the story is that school leaders all over the greater Rochester area are reading and talking about Friedman's book and making changes to their curriculums and school policies. One leader even compared the impact of the book on creating a sense of urgency with the 1983-report "A Nation At Risk."

The part that I found amazing, however, was what one parent decided he needed to do to make sure his kids were getting better science and math instruction. It comes down to this: if you can't beat India, buy the textbooks that you use to tutor your kids afterschool from India.

Srinivas Garapati, a software engineer for Xerox Corp. who moved here from
India five years ago, chose to live in the Brighton school district because of
the quality of its schools. But he is concerned about the strength of the math
and science curricula. In fact, he plans to get textbooks from India that he
will use to supplement his children's education "so they'll be up to the mark."
Garapati, who has watched a videotape of Friedman talking about his ideas, said
the book has "really created a new kind of thinking in the U.S., especially the
schools."

Fascinating. We're talking here about our best schools, not even the bottom half. This reminded me of the Chinese girl in my son's fourth grade class last year who read an essay at a "publishing party" about how bored she was in NYC public schools because so much of what they were doing in fourth grade had been mastered by the students in her first grade class in China.

It also got me thinking: the Yuppies that I bump up against in my world all seem to be spending up the wazoo to pay for tutoring for their kids, simply so that they will get into a good public middle school. This particular dad was thinking about how his kids were going to fare as adults in a rapidly changing world. Interesting contrast in approaches, I think.

Also, speaking of tutoring, the NY Times writes over the weekend about the fact that so few children in failing schools are taking advantage of free tutoring offered under No Child Left Behind. Not sure what else to say about that one. In 2002 and 2003, NYC did an absolutely wretched job notifying parents that the tutoring existed. The city seems to have gotten much better at the outreach, but parents still don't seem to see much value in what is being offered.

UPDATE: This morning's NY Post reports that there still aren't enough good schools in NYC to allow kids to leave their failing schools under NCLB. Hold your horses kids, by the time you are 19 we might have some better options for you.