"On the all important issue of race, Hirsch rejects the view that racism accounts for the problem with many schools in the inner city. He deals with the problem of racism by folding it into his overall concern with schools' failure to provide a core curriculum to all students. In his analysis, Hirsch fails to consider that race, class, and gender influence both content and the way it is presented, and, moreover, that they influence it in a way that reproduces patterns of dominance in our society.
Hirsch's philosophy is based on what is sometimes called a transmission
view of meaning: teachers hold meaning in their heads and their job is to
transmit it in the most efficient way to the heads of students. Whole class
instruction, telling, and rote memorization are frequently seen as the most
effective means for accomplishing this. And standardized tests are the most
effective way to tell if the task has been accomplished. (I suspect this is why,
in analyzing uneven academic achievement, Hirsch does not examine factors
such as class size and unequal funding.)" (Walter Feinberg, 1999)
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