(At the start of his first term) President Bush spoke loud and often about the raw deal poor and minority kids were getting in public school. Instead of a bleeding heart, he showed a kind of flinty compassion for the poor by condemning what he famously called the "soft bigotry of low expectations" that plagued our inner cities. He coupled that with an inspired can-do attitude about making real, lasting change that disarmed even his fiercest opponents.Thus was born the "clear-eyed" bipartisan No Child Left Behind reform, now "chiefly known by its flaws." Spellings talks about the future of NCLB:
The loopholes will get larger," Spellings predicts. "States will game the system as best they can in order to get out of doing what they should do to close the achievement gap. No Child Left Behind turned up the heat. And not everyone is comfortable with that." . . . "Things can't go back the way they used to be — when we didn't have accountability," she implores. "When we didn't care that poor kids were falling behind." She pauses. "Can we?"I don't think so. Update: Jay Mathews writes about an excellent elementary school with mostly black and Hispanic students that's missed progress targets for three years in a row because not enough English Learners test as proficient. The principal would like to be judged on how much students' improve, rather than on whether they reach proficiency, but says the school will work harder to meet targets.
About Joanne
Absolutely we can. Sure as hell we can.
And will.
It is so much more trouble to deal with the disadvantaged, compared to burying their numbers in the general population.
Educrats are first ‘crats. They have budgets. They have constituencies. Disadvantaged kids’ parents are generally a less vocal, less organized constituency than, say the disruptive kids’ parents.
Their parents don’t join the PTA or PTO.
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And back to the good old days.