Why Can’t Schools Be Like Businesses?

Why Can’t Schools Be Like Businesses?

Dissecting the wrong assumptions and ill-conceived logic of business-minded reform proposals for public education

By Larry Cuban

In answering the question posed in the title, I begin with a story that businessman Jamie Vollmer told to educators a few years ago:
“I stood before an audience filled with outraged teachers who were becoming angrier by the minute. My speech had entirely consumed their precious 90 minutes of in-service training. Their initial icy glares had turned to restless agitation. You could cut the hostility with a knife.

“I represented a group of business people dedicated to improving public schools. I was an executive at an ice cream company that became famous in the middle-1980s when People magazine chose its blueberry flavor as the 'Best Ice Cream in America.'

“I was convinced of two things. First, public schools needed to change. They were archaic selecting and sorting mechanisms designed for the Industrial Age and out of step with the needs of our emerging 'knowledge society.' Second, educators were a major part of the problem. They resisted change, hunkered down in their feathered nests, protected by tenure and shielded by a bureaucratic monopoly. They needed to look to business. We knew how to produce quality. Zero defects! Total Quality Management! Continuous improvement!

“As soon as I finished, a woman's hand shot up. She began quietly, 'We are told, sir, that you manage a company that makes good ice cream.'

“I smugly replied, 'Best ice cream in America, ma'am.'

“'How nice,' she said. 'Is it rich and smooth?'

“'Sixteen percent butterfat,' I crowed.

“'Premium ingredients?' she inquired.

“'Super-premium! Nothing but triple-A.'

“I was on a roll. I never saw the next line coming.

“'Mr. Vollmer,' she said, leaning forward with a wicked eyebrow raised to the sky. 'When you are standing on your receiving dock and you see an inferior shipment of blueberries arrive, what do you do?'

“In the silence of that room, I could hear the trap snap.

“I was dead meat, but I wasn't going to lie. 'I send them back.'

“'That's right,’ she barked, 'and we can never send back our blueberries. We take them big, small, rich, poor, gifted, exceptional, abused, frightened, confident, homeless, rude and brilliant. We take them with attention deficit disorder, junior rheumatoid arthritis and English as their second language. We take them all. Every one. And that, Mr. Vollmer, is why it's not a business. It's school.'

“In an explosion, all 290 teachers, principals, bus drivers, aides, custodians and secretaries jumped to their feet and yelled, 'Yeah! Blueberries! Blueberries!'

“And so began my long transformation [from business executive into school reformer].”