Making Failure Pay - 9780226451749

A little-discussed aspect of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) is a mandate that requires failing schools to hire after-school tutoring companiesùthe largest of which are private, for-profit corporationsùand to pay them with federal funds. Making Failure Pay takes a hard look at the implications of this new blurring of the boundaries between government, schools, and commerce in New York City, the country's largest school district.

As Jill P. Koyama explains in this revelatory book, NCLBùa federally legislated, state-regulated, district-administered, and school-applied policyùexplicitly legitimizes giving private organizations significant roles in public education. Based on her three years of ethnographic fieldwork, Koyama finds that the results are political, problematic, and highly profitable. Bringing to light these unproven, unregulated private companies' almost invisible partnership with the government, Making Failure Pay lays bare the unintended consequences of federal efforts to eliminate school failureùnot the least of which is more failure.

"This is a rare and powerful take on the role and work of supplementary educational services. In investigating these services, Koyama has staked out a whole new domain for closer inquiry, successfully convincing us that they deserve scrutiny and often perpetuate failure. Making Failure Pay should be shared and should inform future research and policy making."-Edmund T. Hamann, University Of NebraskaûLincoln

"A riveting and highly disturbing account of the unforeseen effects of NCLB in the New York City Public Schools, Making Failure Pay demonstrates the full force of new anthropological approaches to the examination of educational policy. It exposes NCLB's hidden public-private 'liaisons' that enable companies to profit from the provision of substandard and poorly regulated services that perpetuate student failure. Conceptually sophisticated and lucidly written, this book is indispensable reading for educational policymakers, policy researchers, and all who have a stake in U.S. urban schools."-Peter Demerath, University of Minnesota