The Dewey Society and Social Issues

Yesterday I blogged on Next Things about Google's Knol as an important new reference source. You will find this post cross-posted above because I see Knol as a useful channel for progressive scholarship on today's pressing educational and social issues: from NCLB, to Darwin and evolution in science education, IQ testing and intelligence, charter schools and public-private partnerships, school resegregation, to anti-racist education and many others.

Because Google will be inviting authoritative articles for Knol this appears to be an excellent vehicle for progressive scholars to claim and achieve credibility. Some members can probably position themselves with Google in such a way as to get invited to contribute.

I also recently blogged about the 'manifestos' published by Change This Newsletter as a kind of model for a publication series on pressing issues.

Now I want to share a vision about Dewey Society members, these issues, and this blog and other on-line publications.

Most active members of the society claim serious expertise in one of the listed issues or others. By joining the author team for this blog, Social Issues, a member can lay claim to a particular issue -- can be, in short, our main man (or woman) on IQ or NCLB or Resegregation.

In that way, when other members seek guidance on these issues, for teaching or social action (for example, when preparing letters to editors or Op Ed articles) they can find a valuable archive of informed progressive comment whether on the blog or in something like an on-line version of the Insight books published regularly by PES-GB. Further, by commenting on the blog posts of our main authors, our members can help over time to shape a clear progressive consensus where one is there to be shaped, or to establish a band width of progressive positions.

Then, by linking actively to other blogs and websites, the views of Dewey Society members can enter into a larger progressive discourse.

We will have a workshop at the Dewey Society meeting held in conjunction with AERA in the Spring of 2008. The goal will be further to develop the Society's capabilities in addressing pressing issues through this Blog, its other publications, and its meetings.

I invite comment by all members of the Society.