UNFORTUNATE THAT THE FACTIONS ARE THE PRO-CHILD ONE AND IT'S OPPONENT, THE PRO-UNION ONE:

Duncan Is Obama's Choice for Education Secretary (JOHN HECHINGER and LAURA MECKLER, 12/16/08, Wall Street Journal)

Mr. Duncan has straddled two competing factions of the education community: the teachers unions, who push for more funding and smaller classes, and a movement that favors accountability and free-market-style incentives and looks to hold schools and teachers more accountable for student performance. [...]

Advocates of the law, including both Democrats and Republicans, believe NCLB's testing requirements provides an important way to hold schools accountable for students' achievement. But critics, including teacher's unions, some education experts and school systems, have complained bitterly about the law's frequent testing and lack of funding.

Many education analysts have spoken of a split among Mr. Obama's presidential advisers, which were seen to represent various factions in the debate over education reform. One of his advisers widely seen as a potential choice for Education secretary, Linda Darling-Hammond, a Stanford University education professor, has been sympathetic to the complaints about No Child Left Behind. Another person believed to be a contender, Joel Klein, chancellor of the New York City schools has assigned grades to various schools and tangled more with education unions.

Tom Loveless, an education expert at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank, called Mr. Duncan a "safe choice. It reconciles the disagreements within the Democratic Party."

Monday night, Janet Bass, a spokeswoman for the American Federation of Teachers, which represents Chicago teachers, declined to comment on the appointment prior to the official announcement, but said: "As we have said in the past, we have a high opinion of Arne Duncan."

Joe Williams, executive director of Democrats for Education Reform, a political action committee that advocated for Mr. Duncan to be selected as Education secretary, said he had been a proponent of charter schools, or public schools operated by outside organizations, as well as merit pay for teachers -- both controversial topics among teachers' unions.

Mayor Daley is as Third Way as any post-Clinton Democrat, especially on Education, so this pick, though cautious, is as good as could be hoped from a shallow bench.

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Posted by Orrin Judd at December 16, 2008 2:08 PM