[Free Schools is] a short, highly readable, and informative volume about the prospects for, and the problems of, free schools. The book consists basically of two themes: one is a useful discussion of how to form and sustain a free school based on Kozol's own experiences in Boston; the other is a critical commentary on some of the failings of the free school movement. Both themes will be useful to those working in the movement as well as to those with serious interests in "alternative" education.

Perhaps Kozol's basic criticism of the thrust of the free school movement in the past few years is its failure to provide a viable educational program for those young people involved in it. The notion of "do your own thing," Kozol claims, is an insufficient educational philosophy and is particularly dangerous when it is applied to children from working class and ghetto...