Push Has Come to Shove: Getting Our Kids the Education They Deserve--Even If It Means Picking a Fight

Take it from a guy who knows what it’s like to work a lot of gigs: Dr. Steve Perry, who divides his time between being the planet’s most effective school principal and a shake-up-people’s-thinking contributor to CNN, is the hardest-working man in the education biz. And that’s damn lucky for the thousands of kids who, because of Perry’s “serious as a heart attack” approach to education, are now heading off to four-year colleges rather than talking trash on street corners. It’s lucky, too, for parents who get to read this amazing book. The title, Push Has Come to Shove, is pure Perry-- and so are the big fat water balloons Perry aims at the education system’s many culprits. But Perry isn’t just a funny-as-hell, fed-up-and-tired-of-excuses dude giving “don’t know jack” teacher’s-union goons, lazy teachers, and political hacks well deserved kicks in the pants, the man has real solutions. He lays it all out here: how to get your kid better teachers, a better curriculum, and a better future. I love Steve’s impatience: he doesn’t want any of us to be putting up one more day with what we’ve been putting up with. He wants your kid turned on right now to the idea of being smarter. It’s about time someone inside the education system pulled back the curtain on what’s lacking, so the common man can help his children get an exceptional education.

--Steve Harvey