Review of 'Creating a Data-Informed Culture in Community Colleges' on 'Goodreads'
1 star
Let's call this Reforming America's Community Colleges 2.0. In fact, this book and its authors take their place in the incestuous circle of the non-profits, consultants, "think tanks", all funded by Gates money, all referring to each other, all promoting the same ideas. These ideas are presented as neutral, data-informed, but the Gates Foundation money comes with heavy ideological baggage that is never acknowledged. The present book claims to be based on research from behavioral economics to neuroscience, conveniently avoiding the sociological research (and social factors underlying the issues they examine).
As with the other books from the same pool, we get the same ideas that lead to institutional bloatware and will require layers of administrative management, dashboards, reports. All of this is in the promotion of an agenda that is touted as successful but somehow requires a lot of institutional work to be accepted under the old "who moved …
Let's call this Reforming America's Community Colleges 2.0. In fact, this book and its authors take their place in the incestuous circle of the non-profits, consultants, "think tanks", all funded by Gates money, all referring to each other, all promoting the same ideas. These ideas are presented as neutral, data-informed, but the Gates Foundation money comes with heavy ideological baggage that is never acknowledged. The present book claims to be based on research from behavioral economics to neuroscience, conveniently avoiding the sociological research (and social factors underlying the issues they examine).
As with the other books from the same pool, we get the same ideas that lead to institutional bloatware and will require layers of administrative management, dashboards, reports. All of this is in the promotion of an agenda that is touted as successful but somehow requires a lot of institutional work to be accepted under the old "who moved my cheese" mantra that people are naturally resistant to chance. And here as well, we get the same patronizing "ignore your older cranky faculty, invest in the hip, and cool, and newer ones who understand data". Get faculty "champions" (which is well and good but only if those are seen as legitimate and not the usual administrators favorites).
And the other part of the playbook is to "not let a good crisis go to waste", which is gross and manipulative.
I'm sure higher education administrators will eat all this up. This is all presented in the name of "student success" so, of course, any critical examination can easily be dismissed.