How can schools teach the skills required for a strong democracy to flourish? What Kind of Citizen? asks readers to imagine the kind of society they would like to live in—and then shows the ways in which schools can be used to make that vision a reality. Westheimer draws on groundbreaking research on school programs and policies to sharply critique the current direction of school reform. He points to the many varied and powerful ways to teach children and young adults to engage critically, to think about social issues, and to participate in authentic debate that acknowledges that intelligent adults can have different opinions. But today’s teachers are being forced to abandon these practices in favor of test-preparation in only a very narrow set of academic subjects. How did this happen? What can we do to set schools back on the right track? How can we realign school goals with what research shows parents, children, and teachers actually care about? How can we save our schools from today’s myopic interpretation of what constitutes an education? Westheimer answers these questions and makes a powerful call for schools to become more engaging, more democratic, and more educative.

What does it mean to be “patriotic” in the United States after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001? And how have the prevailing notions of patriotism—loudly trumpeted in the American media—affected education in American schools? In this wide-ranging, thoughtful, and spirited book, renowned educational leaders and classroom practitioners answer these questions with insights, opinions, and hard facts.

It was supposed to be a dull day downtown. On September 28, 1999, I rode the subway to the court building where I would offer testimony to a hearing officer from the New York regional office of the National Labor Relations Board. I was to testify, of my own volition, on behalf of New York University graduate students who were seeking to join a union, then return uptown to teach my afternoon class in NYU’s School of Education. When I entered the room where the hearing was to take place, however, it was easy to tell that the stakes were high. I already knew that NYU had hired the same high-profile law firm used previously by Yale and presently by Columbia University. But to my surprise, not one but three lawyers for the university were present along with two high-ranking university officials, each dressed in a carefully pressed suit and tie: the vice dean of my school and NYU vice president, Robert Berne. Then there I was, a young, untenured assistant professor, dressed in rumpled khakis. I was called to the stand, and lawyers for both sides began with prepared questions. The hearing room grew increasingly tense, the questioning increasingly fierce.

Exactly what are teacher communities? What are they after? How do they begin? Do they evolve through stages? How alike or different are they from one another? How are such communities built? It is these important questions that Joel Westheimer turns to in Among Schoolteachers. This is a compelling and thoroughly readable account of two middle schools—one urban and one suburban--that attempt to build communities which will foster student growth and learning. With much fine-grained detail about how each professional community conducted its daily affairs, the author delves beneath the surface to reveal enormous differences in the goals, structures, processes, and beliefs of these communities and offers a new conceptual model for understanding teacher communities in practice. This book shatters prevailing beliefs and furthers our understanding of the ways in which teachers’ relationships impact their work and their lives in schools.