Valerie Strauss
begins a recent commentary in the Washington
Post’s “Answer Sheet” (April 20, 2013) this way: “Talk about
corporate-based school reform. New high-stakes standardized tests aligned with
the Common Core State Standards are featuring plugs for commercial products.”
Then, in the very next sentence, she undermines her own argument by saying,
“And the companies didn’t have to pay a penny.”
It would be
different—and far more damning—if Pearson were making money à la Hollywood movies by charging for
product placement, or what is also called embedded marketing. Ever wonder why
your favorite movie star is drinking Pepsi instead of Coca-Cola? It’s because
Pepsi paid for the product placement, not Coca-Cola.
Companies are
not paying Pearson, according to Strauss. Therefore, Pearson’s claim that the
tests merely use authentic text, brand names and all, is accurate—to a point.
They are being slightly disingenuous, however, if we are meant to believe that
brand-name mentions are wholly unavoidable.
In fact, Pearson
is following a long history of creeping commercialism in public schools. Once
upon a time, school boards, parents, and educators fretted over allowing
certain commercial products into the public schools. Vending machines initially
were resisted as much on grounds that their placement implied acceptance and
promotion of the products they sold as over the issue that the products were
void of nutritional value. The machines were widely adopted anyway, and next some
cafeteria foods, particularly at high school and college levels, were
outsourced to brand-name companies, such as Pizza Hut.
Readers may
remember some of the controversy surrounding the launch in 1990 of Chris
Whittle’s Channel One, which broadcasts specially prepared television news in
middle and high schools. Whittle’s enterprise provides the TVs—and the
commercials. While critics decry Channel One for “forcing” students to watch
ads, supporters argue that the ads keep the programs running and pay for the TV
leases.
There should be
little doubt in anyone’s mind that brand-name product placement and “embedded”
advertising in public schools implies endorsement of the goods and services on offer.
Conspiracy theorists might argue that commercialization is a slippery slope
toward even more sinister forms of corporatization of public education, such as
the siphoning off of public monies to support vouchers for private schools and
the selling off of “failing” public schools to corporations that promise but
often don’t deliver a turnaround.
The conspiracy
theorists might even be right.
