Sputnik—Advancing Education Through Innovation and Evidence

Robert Slavin's new Education Week blog, Sputnik: Advancing Education Through Innovation and Evidence, focuses on research and innovation and their effect on education policy. The blog's title is a nod to the Soviet satellite, which he explains galvanized the United States into an era of innovation.

Slavin laments what he perceives as the lack of this spirit in today's education reform landscape:

Instead of investing in research and innovation, as we did in the wake of Sputnik, our leaders today try to solve our educational problems by fiddling with management solutions, governance solutions, and assessment solutions that do not fundamentally change what happens between teachers and students… The reason it was Neil Armstrong and not Nikolai Armstronganoff who landed on the moon was that we invested in targeted, relentless research and development. We did not manage our way to the moon, we invented our way to the moon.

The blog features posts from Slavin, director of the Center for Research and Reform in Education at Johns Hopkins University, and guest bloggers, such as Jim Shelton, assistant deputy secretary of the Office of Innovation and Improvement at the U.S. Department of Education. So far, notable posts have included a skeptical guide to interpreting "education miracles" and a post calling for greater innovation in our education system, which echoes many of ASCD author Yong Zhao's sentiments from his recent book Catching Up or Leading the Way.

The blog is off to a promising start and provides a compelling, big-picture framework for considering the importance of research-based innovation in education.