Packaging and Marketing: Kaavya and NCTM standards

Dinitia Smith's 25 April 2006 NYT article, posted at

http://groups.google.com/group/agora1/msg/7b1a445745aa40fa?dmode=print&hl=en

describes how Kaavya Viswanathan's admission to Harvard and her book
deal were packaged and marketed by Katherine Cohen of Ivy-Wise and by
17th Street Productions, respectively.

Samuel G. Freedman's 26 April 2006 column, posted at:

http://groups.google.com/group/WiredCounselor/msg/e1b380e46ebf697d?dmo...print&h

describes how the college admissions process has degenerated.

In view of the above, It is timely to reexamine what Michael J. Bosse
["The NCTM standards in light of the new math movement: a warning!,"
Journal of Mathematical Behavior, Vol. 14 (1995) 171-201] wrote about
the packaging and marketing of the 1989 NCTM standards.

On page 196, Bosse wrote:

"As previously mentioned, the NCTM hired a public relations firm to
promote the Standards and to get it into the eye of politicians and
policy makers. Some believed that the marketing strategy employed by
the NCTM is one of the most significant successes of the Standards.

We know that is important to consider how to get the message
through. We realized that what we did must influence policy makers,
and not teachers alone. We deliberately went out to influence policy
makers. (NCTM4)
At the national level there's plenty of Standards-waiving going on
to promote standards in other curricula. Therefore, the standards
as a deliberate political act is successful. (NCTM2)

"Undeniably, this public relations strategy employed by the NCTM has
been enormously successful in its endeavors. With the promotion of the
Standards by a public relations firm and some influential congressmen
on the federal level, the Standards quickly reached the attention of
the nation. So impressed were some educationally minded politicians
with the NCTM Standards that the lack of standards in other curricular
areas was questioned. This became the impetus for other fields to
generate their own set of standards."

The NCTM retained the public relations firm of Burson Marsteller, 230
Park Ave South, New York City. Evidently, the NCTM paid this firm about
$250,000.

Dom Rosa