
How Schools Work
An Inside Account of Failure and Success from One of the Nation's Longest-Serving Secretaries of Education
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Narrated by:
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Arne Duncan
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By:
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Arne Duncan
From the Secretary of Education under President Obama, an exposé of the status quo that helps maintain a broken system at the expense of our kids’ education.
“Education runs on lies. That’s probably not what you’d expect from a former Secretary of Education, but it’s the truth.” So opens Arne Duncan’s How Schools Work, although the title could just as easily be How American Schools Work for Some, Not for Others, and Only Now and Then for Kids.
Drawing on nearly three decades in education - from his mother’s after-school program on Chicago’s South Side to his tenure as Secretary of Education in DC - How Schools Work follows Arne (as he insists you call him) as he takes on challenges at every turn: gangbangers in Chicago housing projects, parents who call him racist, teachers who insist they can’t help poor kids, unions that refuse to modernize, Tea Partiers who call him an autocrat, affluent white progressive moms who hate yearly tests, and even the NRA, which once labeled Arne the “most extreme anti-gun member of President Obama's Cabinet.” Going to a child’s funeral every couple of weeks, as he did when he worked in Chicago, will do that to a person.
How Schools Work exposes the lies that have caused American kids to fall behind their international peers, from early childhood all the way to college graduation rates. But it also celebrates the countless everyday heroes Arne has encountered along the way: teachers, principals, reformers, staffers, business people, mayors, and presidents.
How Schools Work will inspire parents, teachers, voters, and even students to demand more of our public schools. If America is going to be great, then we can accept nothing less.
©2018 Arne Duncan (P)2018 Simon & SchusterListeners also enjoyed...




















Education leads the way
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Such an important book
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I am keeping my fingers crossed that Former Secretary Duncan writes and releases more books! .
Spectacular
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Exceptional and much needed book - must read
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Absolutely Loved this Book
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This is a must read for people interested in education
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doesn't explain how schools actually work.
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Democrat who seeks change in public education.
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In the end, our democracy experiment is failing because of our unwillingness to assure that all Americans can really take advantage of equal opportunity. It’s just not the case and he shows us this through his lifetime of service. Every American should read this.
Plus it’s a well-told story, so not that hard to read or value the time it takes.
Terrific
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As a school superintendent, this book was difficult for me to muddle through. It is full of self- grandeur, with Arne telling the reader how great the feds are with federal programs like as No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, etc. If any of those federal overreaches worked, we wouldn’t be in the state that we are in with our American education system.
Many of his stories were unrelated to our educational and completely unnecessary-he even managed to work and is anti-gun rhetoric towards the end of the book. I found the last 1/4 of the book to be generally useless as it relates t I proving education, as he rants about white privilege, mis-policing, etc.
Overall, this book had great potential but went nowhere as it relates to tangible ways to improve education. As an educator, I was disappointed in what could have (and perhaps should have) been a great read.
Strayed off topic regularly.
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