The New York Times, echoing Petrilli, Finn and Hess, warns that Congress has to make sure the proposed economic stimulus package does not undermine education reform. “The money needs to be targeted in a way that forces the states to adopt reforms required under the No Child Left Behind Act of 2002,” argues an editorial in this morning’s paper.
Arne Duncan, the education secretary, has a burgeoning discretionary budget that can be used to reward those states that embrace reform and prod those states that continue to lag. Mr. Duncan’s main goal should be to replace a wildly uneven patchwork of standards with a coherent system of national standards and tests that would allow parents to know, at last, how their schools compare with schools elsewhere in the country.
A pretty high profile endorsement for a common sense reform. Now, will someone please sit down with the editorial board of the Times and explain the difference between clear and coherent content standards and squishy skills or performance standards, before this turns into a case of be careful what you wish for?
Robert,
The Washington Post had a similar editorial last week.
Thanks, Paul. I had overlooked that one. Here’s a link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012803261.html
Oh, national standards has always been a case of be careful what you wish for. And if you think that you lose if it is a combination of what you want and what “21st Century Skills” people want, you’d be much better off just quitting now and focusing on building Core Knowledge schools, because you’re never in a million years going to get a national Core Knowledge curriculum. I’m not saying that as a critic — it is simply ever, ever going to happen.
I’d settle for a broad understanding that content knowledge and reading comprehension are inseparable, and that “21st century skills” don’t exist in a content-free vacuum. Give me that and you can call it whatever you want.
Might it not be a bit dangerous to mix the national standards question in with stimulus, per the Post’s recommendation? Given the short time frame of stimulus spending, it may actually harm the national standards movement–or other complex reforms–to yoke national standards to money that aims to provide an immediate jolt to the economy.