For most of the twentieth century, America's love affair with the car went unchallenged. Gas prices were kept low, ever more roads and highways built and maintained, and this year's model always looked a little better than last year's. Then, in fairly short order, gas jumped to $4 a gallon, the housing bubble imploded and the current economic crisis was upon us. Suddenly, car owners had reason to question what is on average, their biggest household expense. Carjacked gets into the meat of America's obsession with cars and explodes myth after myth along the way. While the automobile's contribution to global warming and the effects of volatile gas prices are is widely known, the problems Americans face every day because of their cars are much more widespread and yet much less known - from the surprising $14,000 per year that the average car costs to own to the uptick of incidences of obesity and asthma that car ownership seemingly causes to the more than 6 million car accidents a year at a cost of $230 billion. Carjacked sheds new light on the complex impact of the automobile on American society and shows us how to develop a new and healthier relationship with cars, a relationship that is both cheaper and greener.

Depicted variously as heroes, villains, or victims, America's teachers find themselves at the center of a sometimes nasty policy debate. Yet, while politicians, reformers, and pundits contribute to the cacophony that serves as our national conversation about education, those who teach our children everyday are barely heard over the noise. This beautifully written book highlights working teachers speaking on many key educational problems under debate as well as many of the controversial solutions put forth, including revamped teacher evaluations, curricular standardization, and increased testing and data collection. Anthropologist Catherine Lutz and high school teacher Anne Lutz Fernandez traveled the country to meet a wide range of educators on the frontlines of teaching across diverse contexts from traditional public schools to charters to the home school; early in careers and near retirement; in city, town, suburb, and country. What they learned about teaching and learning provides critical insights not just for educators but for anyone interested in American education.

Depicted variously as heroes, villains, or victims, America's teachers find themselves at the center of a sometimes nasty policy debate. Yet, while politicians, reformers, and pundits contribute to the cacophony that serves as our national conversation about education, those who teach our children everyday are barely heard over the noise. This beautifully written book highlights working teachers speaking on many key educational problems under debate as well as many of the controversial solutions put forth, including revamped teacher evaluations, curricular standardization, and increased testing and data collection. Anthropologist Catherine Lutz and high school teacher Anne Lutz Fernandez traveled the country to meet a wide range of educators on the frontlines of teaching across diverse contexts from traditional public schools to charters to the home school; early in careers and near retirement; in city, town, suburb, and country. What they learned about teaching and learning provides critical insights not just for educators but for anyone interested in American education.