This week’s podcast begins with a comment by Former Secretary of Labor William Brock in the Sunday Parade Magazine:
I explain my issues with his response to fixing American schools in his quote:

First, we have to agree that we have a problem. In the last 25 years, spending has risen 240% while performance has barely changed. Only 68% of students graduate from high school, and many states require only eighth-grade skills in reading and math to get a diploma.

The statistics are probably from The New Commission on the Skills of the America Workforce (in which he is chairman). The problem is that it is difficult to find the research or the survey that these numbers are based on. I would really like to find out the accuracy of the second sentence, because it is so loaded (but I could not find it on the New Commission site).

Some of the most interesting business models have come from the spirit of the “In Search of Excellence” theme (Peters et al) and I think a recent example of how business can work in an exciting way (instead of the typical “top-down” approach) is from American Airlines and here’s the NPR report that describes the new leadership (from two years ago).