Scripting the Moves

An inside look at a "no-excuses" charter school that reveals this educational model¿s strengths and weaknesses, and how its approach shapes students

Silent, single-file lines. Detention for putting a head on a desk. Rules for how to dress, how to applaud, how to complete homework. Walk into some of the most acclaimed urban schools today and you will find similar recipes of behavior, designed to support student achievement. But what do these ¿scripts¿ accomplish? Immersing readers inside a ¿no-excuses¿ charter school, Scripting the Moves offers a telling window into an expanding model of urban education reform. Through interviews with students, teachers, administrators, and parents, and analysis of documents and data, Joanne Golann reveals that such schools actually dictate too rigid a level of social control for both teachers and their predominantly low-income Black and Latino students. Despite good intentions, scripts constrain the development of importa