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Selling public education

April 1, 2009

KALAMAZOO--Dr. Kenneth Saltman, a critic of running public schools along corporate lines, will deliver a talk from 7 to 9 p.m. Monday, April 6, at Western Michigan University as part of a series of lectures addressing social justice and education issues.

Saltman is associate professor in the DePaul University Department of Educational Policy Studies and Research. His talk, titled "The Gift of Education: Toward a General Economy of Education," will take place in the Fetzer Center's Putney Auditorium and is free and open to the public.

Saltman is especially well known for two books, "Education as Enforcement: The Militarization and Corporatization of Schools" and "Capitalizing on Disaster: Taking and Breaking Public Schools." In them, he asserts that the current education system has become a business designed to first serve corporate interests, then political interests and, lastly, individual and community interests. Saltman has become one of the fiercest critics of what he sees as a corporate and militaristic assault on public schools. "Capitalizing on Disaster" was awarded the American Educational Studies Association Critics Choice book award.

Saltman also is the author of many articles on educational theory and policy, as well as essays on the philosophy of sports and the body. He is a Fulbright Scholar and founding editor of the educational policy book review Web site Book Smarts.

Media contact: Mark Schwerin, (269) 387-8400, mark.schwerin@wmich.edu

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