I just finished reading
The Parent Trap: How to Stop Overloading Parents and Fix Our Inequality Crisis by Nate Hilger. Some years ago, Nate was a Harvard student, who I knew only slightly, and he was nice enough to send me a copy. I can report that it is terrific--smartly argued and very well written. The basic theme is that society needs to do more to help children build skills outside of the normal school day.
I balked at the last chapter, which seems to suggest that if you don't agree with the foregoing arguments, you are either ignorant or racist. Of course, Nate says that more diplomatically than I just did, but that is what I took away from it. Before that, however, the book drew me in and was largely persuasive. It deserves to be widely read.
