The Power of Their Ideas

Teaching the lessons of New York’s most famous public school, Deborah Meier provides a widely acclaimed vision for the future of public education. With a new preface reflecting on the school’s continuing success.

“The founder and principal of excellent small schools in East Harlem . . . Meier wants to make all students capable of participating in and sustaining a democracy. . . . Doubters must read Deborah Meier to take a look at that success up close, to watch it begin and grow and flourish.” -Lorene Cary, The New York Times Book Review

“Meier pledges her faith ‘in the extraordinary untapped capacities of all our children’; but, unlike so many radical reformers, she is also firmly rooted in the reality of the classroom. . . .What has propelled people like Meier from the periphery to the center of the ongoing school debate is the recognition that a new and different form of public school is no longer a luxury.” -James Traub, The New Yorker

“Written in prose that runs like a clear stream past the sludge of educational discourse. . . .The fate of public education today depends on whether we listen to . . . the Deborah Meiers of the land.” -Joseph Featherstone, The Nation

“A fiery manifesto of Meier’s plan for the salvation of public education.” -Los Angeles Times

“A book not of blueprints and slogans, but of essays-reflective and analytical. The Power of Their Ideas is the product of a lively mind.” -The Washington Post

“Anyone who wants to get insight into the current waves of endless ‘reform’ debate should read it.” -Philadelphia Inquirer

“Meier documents her 30 years in schools. . . . She has captured the national imagination in a way that few public school teachers do.” -Muriel Cohen, The Boston Globe

“Destined to change the way we think about teaching and learning, schooling and education.” -William Ayers, Rethinking Schools