Five Year Itch
By Goldwater Institute: Dan Lips (01/10/07)
Congress should put the NCLB “Charter State” option back on the table - Five years ago yesterday, President Bush signed into law No Child Left Behind (NCLB). As a new Congress prepares to debate the law’s future, the White House is working to build support for renewing it without any serious reforms.
President Bush once advocated limiting federal power in education. During the 2000 campaign, he pledged that he did not want to be “federal superintendent of schools” or the “national principal.” After entering the White House, Bush unveiled the original NCLB plan. One of this plan’s main pillars was to give states and school districts control in exchange for accountability.
The president proposed a “charter state” option that would have allowed participating states and districts to enter into five-year agreements with the secretary of education to free them from federal mandates while still requiring public school to be transparent about results.
Yet Congress scrapped much of President Bush’s original plan. The 1,100-page bill that emerged established new federal requirements and boosted funding for elementary and secondary education approximately 26 percent. All that remained of the “charter state” option was a small provision to grant states and school districts limited flexibility in transferring funds between existing federal programs.
The federal government still provides only 8.5 percent of education funding, but policies once left to local leaders, concerning student testing and teacher qualifications, are now set by the federal government.
This new federal power comes at a large cost to local school districts, beyond the loss of control. According to the Office of Management and Budget, NCLB costs state and local communities an additional 6,688,814 hours, or $140 million, to fill out paperwork and ensure compliance. Thousands of state and local workers across the country spend their days on this task, instead of teaching students or otherwise contributing to their education.
In 2007, Democrats and Republicans alike should recognize the benefits of state and local control in education. Letting states enter into a “charter agreement” with the federal government for greater freedom and flexibility would spur progress in education.
Communities across the country would experiment with different policies, share results, and learn which solutions work best, from school choice to higher teacher pay. The 110th Congress has the opportunity to set a new course for American education. Restoring state and local control should be its destination.
Dan Lips is education analyst at the Heritage Foundation and a senior fellow with the Goldwater Institute. A longer version of this article appeared in the Washington Examiner.
http://www.goldwaterinstitute.org/aboutus/ArticleView.aspx?id=1335
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