Obama administration must embrace real education reform, not just rhetoric
From the desk of the Center for Education Reform:
WASHINGTON, DC - In response to President Barack Obama's remarks today on his Administration's education reform initiatives and Race to the Top competition, Center for Education Reform president Jeanne Allen released the following statement:
Today, President Obama championed his administration's education reform initiatives in a Wisconsin speech, focusing on states that he claims are leading the charge for education reform.
The Obama Administration has jumped on board the charter school bandwagon and, in doing so, is telling states they must do better and create or fix laws in order to compete for their share of $4.3 billion in federal "Race to the Top" funds.
As admirable as the Obama administration's policy on charters may appear to be, the President and his Education Secretary are, too often, giving states credit for talking about charter schools rather than actually changing laws to improve the likelihood that children will have real school choice.
For example, Education Secretary Arne Duncan's description of reforms in Tennessee, Rhode Island, Indiana, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Illinois has been misleading. While the Secretary has said that 'numerous states have adopted reforms that would have been almost unthinkable a year ago,' this is simply not the case.
No state cited in this popular mythology has revoked limits on the number of charters allowed to open this year. Several, in fact, merely fulfilled budgetary promises of charter funding after having first wiped them off the books.
In reality, most of the nation's 40 charter laws will need dramatic legislative changes to develop robust charter laws that actually allow for the growth of the types of schools both President Obama and Secretary Duncan routinely credit with raising academic achievement and turning around students' lives.
We want to see states get bold and adopt strong charter laws - which everyone knows how to do, but often aren't courageous enough to buck the status quo, the unions, and even continued ignorance of what precisely a charter school is. But that isn't happening.
For President Obama and his Education Secretary to claim victory before "Race" participants have even reached the starting gate is disappointing.
It is time that President Obama and Secretary Duncan stop championing half measures and start demanding real results and bold changes in state laws.
Before you rail too heavily against states making permanent changes to their education systems, please show me where charter schools have been shown to be more effective than traditional public schools. While you're at it, could you list the differences between charter schools and traditional public schools? Finally, if charter schools are "the answer", why don't more teachers, parents, students, school boards, and community members strive to convert all their schools?
And while you are blaming unions for standing in the way of this "progress", please realize that they are trying to maintain the current wage and working conditions.
NCLB was designed to show that schools were "failing". Race to the top is designed to turn "failing" schools into charter schools. Keep in mind that in the next few years "failing" under NCLB will be when one student does not perform at a proficient level on a test that has no effect on the students grades, graduation, or anything else.
Education needs reform. Competition does not close gaps, it widens them. Cooperation leads to everyone winning. In a competition, there is a loser. Let's not label more kids and schools as losers.