COME INTO MY PARLOR SAID THE SPIDER TO THE FLY:

Bait-and-Switch on Public Education (NY Times, 10/21/03)

The new law is supposed to place a qualified teacher in every classroom and wipe out the achievement gap between rich and poor children. Schools that fail to make steady progress are labeled deficient and required to provide students with costly tutoring and allow them to transfer to more successful public schools in the same district.

In some districts, more than 40 percent of the schools are called "in need of improvement." The lack of money from Congress has licensed a backlash by states that never wanted to comply with the law anyway, especially the provision that requires ending the achievement gap between rich and poor.

Right on cue, these states are pressing Congress to suspend the new standards and accountability measures — until full financing is made available. A few brave lawmakers, like the Democratic whip, Representative Steny Hoyer of Maryland, have taken a strong stand against this. While criticizing the G.O.P. for failing to fully finance the new law, Mr. Hoyer and others have urged the states to stay the course and to discontinue the practice of educating affluent children while letting the poor fall by the wayside.

The Bush administration wanted to trumpet No Child Left Behind, then fail to pay for it — without the voters taking notice.

Boy, you can't sneak anything past the Times, can you? The point of the law--and it represents a signal victory for the President, one that was obvious even as it was being negotiated--is to force vouchers locally, not to fund education nationally. Meanwhile, how much would Karl Rove love it if Ted Kennedy, congressional Democrats, and some weak-kneed Republicans pass a bill that lowers education standards so that the President can veto it?

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 21, 2003 10:57 AM