The Obama administration is silently implementing his education reform. Unlike the debate over healthcare and financial reform legislation, the White House is implementing its strategy without any debate or legislation for that matter. And what’s worse, the administration’s plan is flawed and misguided at best. This is disappointing because education was an area that many thought Obama would excel. After all, he grew up in poverty but this did not stop him from earning a Harvard Law degree on his way to the White House. Thus, one may conclude that Obama would understand how to overcome the massive high school drop out rates and the abysmal test scores of millions of students across America.
Obama’s first step at reforming education in the United States was to appoint, Arne Duncan, head of the Department of Education. Duncan previously served as the Chief Executive Officer of Chicago schools. Under his leadership test scores improved dramatically, but this is a misleading statistic. The tests were watered down and this fact was confirmed when local community colleges reported that 70% of all Chicago graduates were not proficient in reading, writing, and simple math.
Duncan has some fairly extreme views on how to handle education. First, he does not believe in competition, which incidentally makes him a favorite amongst the teacher’s unions. This protects good teachers, but it also makes it impossible to get rid of bad teachers. Secondly, he believes that the school education process should begin at birth and last 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 52 weeks out of the year. In other words, he wants to take parenting out of education and have our kids being raised by grossly overworked and underpaid teachers. Thirdly, he wants to create a uniform national standard, instead of state standards, for reading, writing, and math. Fourth, he wants the federal government to control all aspects of education. He wants to strip states and local governments of any control over education, similarly to what he did he Chicago.
Duncan and Obama have similar views on how to reform and control education. Duncan’s first project was the dismantling of the successful Washington D.C. voucher program. This is one way to eliminate competition and to cater to the teacher’s union which protects bad teachers. It is important to note that Obama and Duncan send their kids to the same private schools they are denying other socioeconomically challenged kids. This is hypocrisy at its best.
The Obama – Duncan silent education plan is called “Race to the Top”. Their plan to implement their agenda is to bribe local and state governments. Those who conform with their vision will receive federal funding. On the other hand, those who do not conform will be denied funding for Title I students. Title I is a program where the federal government provides compensation to schools based on children who are socioeconomically challenged. Thus, under the Obama plan, a wealthy school district that agrees to national standardized testing, longer hours, and other federal ideas, will be rewarded with extra funding. Meanwhile, the converse is true, poor school districts can be denied federal funding. This is a bad plan!
National Standards may sound like a great idea, but all standardized testing is flawed. It grossly neglects other curriculum and it leads to corruption. Think about it; a student’s entire year is based on a one day test. One sample in a 180 day year is not indicative to ones performance. After all, anyone can have a good or bad day. Obama’s plan is to make sure every student is prepared for college. But this is unrealistic, not every kid is college material and trade schools are needed. As far as longer school days and years are concerned – this is crazy. Humans can only concentrate so long and absorb so much information therefore; students will not retain a proportional amount of information. In other words, much of the extra school time will be wasted. It is also arrogant and ignorant to assume that the federal government best understands the students in each individual municipality across the United States better than the parents and local government. More government is not the answer to better education.
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