The central idea in W. Edwards Deming's approach to quality management is the need to improve process. Outcome-based education's central defect is its failure to address process. Deming would reject OBE along with management-by-objectives. Education is not a product defined by specific output measures, but a process to develop the mind. (MLH)

Whether viewed through Deming's 14 points, Juran's Trilogy, or Kaoru Ishikawa's Thought Revolution, Total Quality Management embodies 4 fundamental tenets: primary focus on customers and suppliers, universal commitment to continuous improvement, a systems approach, and top management responsibility. Educational organizations are recreating their…

The United States no longer has the best educated workforce in the world. To maintain its current standard of living and successfully compete in the global economy, the country needs to overhaul an antiquated education system that is not geared to produce the graduates it needs. In a new report, Tough Choices or Tough Times, the New Commission on…

Lists eight effects that could result from the ruling in "Mozert v. Hawkins County Public Schools." These include widespread censorship, limitation of controversial topics, interference with management of instruction, and disruption of the school day. (MD)

"A Nation at Risk" emphasizes the importance of quality education to the nation's well-being, insisting that, although our current educational system is mediocre, we can do better. The book makes recommendations in such areas as curriculum and time management, standards and expectations, teacher status, excellence and equity, and…

Educational management organizations (EMOs) are for-profit, private companies that manage schools, including 10% of all charter schools. Major investment houses consider public education a $300 billion industry ripe for picking, due to three driving market forces--cost, quality, and consumer confidence. Three EMOs (TesseracT Group, Edison Project…

If educators endorse Alfie Kohn's surface message about Total Quality Management, they may miss opportunity to professionalize education. Deming's system of profound knowledge (interaction of theories of systems, knowledge, psychology, and variation) is a model for educated people grappling with life's complexities. Moreover, gaining community…

Before jumping on another corporate bandwagon, educators should recall the primary difference between business and education. Workers produce consumer goods, whereas students should be concerned with constructing meaning. The marketplace model, even correctly applied, does not belong in the classroom. Total Quality Management is a content-free,…

Total Quality Management is a value-based, information-driven management process through which the minds and talents of people at all levels are applied fully and creatively to the organization's continuous improvement. The total quality view allows educators to see with a student's eye, to understand what the school and the world look like to…

A Deming expert explains that his 14 principles are no recipe but must be combined with the theory of profound knowledge, which poses essential questions and recognizes the importance of human variation, intrinsic motivation, and external rewards. She also debunks grading, formal teacher evaluation, tracking, and decentralized management. (MLH)

After training in the Total Quality Management concept, a suburban Ohio school district created a Deming Users' Group to link agencies, individuals, and ideas. The group has facilitated ongoing school/business collaboration, networking among individuals from diverse school systems, mentoring and cooperative learning activities, and resource…

Alfie Kohn seems ill-informed about Total Quality Management's educational benefits. Students have always been workers; what is changing is the nature of that work. In schools of quality, teachers and students learn together as they create collaborative, trusting environments where failure is but a temporary step on the road to continuous…

Although Alfie Kohn is a first-rate thinker, his article in the same "Educational Leadership" issue confuses adopting Total Quality Management methods with intelligently adapting them. Kohn wrestles too hard with the "worker/student" metaphor and wrongly disparages Deming's emphasis on data and performance. Schools can definitely benefit from…

Research studies on educational reform show that moving from reform to quality education through centrally designed reform movements (such as clearer legislation or other strategies) is inherently limited. Reform is most likely to succeed when schools are stimulated to change and provided with appropriate assistance and when schools receive enough…

Deming's quality-focused principles contradict Taylor's top-down, authoritarian industrial model. Deming advises educators to fix the system instead of blaming individual teachers for student apathy and low achievement. In the new paradigm, education will be a process that encourages continual progress through improving one's abilities, expanding…