Gormley’s New Book Offers Fresh Insight on Critical Thinking in Education

McCourt Professor William Gormley is shaping the conversation surrounding education policy with his newly published book focusing on remedying the critical thinking skills deficit in preK–12.

Professor Gormley first delineates a modern interpretation of critical thinking and outlines how school curriculums are missing the mark.

He then draws on research from various disciplines to argue that critical thinking, if prioritized in education for students at an early age, can resolve major societal challenges including education deficits, employment deficits, and even the recent surge of partisanship in democratic politics.

Taking readers through innovative classrooms in Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, Professor Gormley illuminates success stories that are helping to integrate critical thinking skills into the curriculum – and that can serve as examples for the rest of the nation.

The book, “The Critical Advantage: Developing Critical Thinking Skills in School”, is timely with its reasoned, intellectual contribution to education policy, at a time when debates over funding, school choice, intergovernmental relations, standards, curriculum, and more, stand to profoundly shape the future of our education systems.

Professor Gormley’s research has been featured across national media and his counsel has informed numerous education policy implementations. In addition to authoring several other books and serving as a professor of public policy and government, he is co-director of the Center for Research on Children in the United States, based at Georgetown University.

“The Critical Advantage” can be purchased via the Harvard Education Press website .