No Child Left Behind

George W. Bush wants to be remembered as the Education President. In his first term, President Bush reached across the aisle to work with Senator Kennedy of Massachusetts to pass the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001.

No Child Left Behind (NCLB) is designed to bring about improvements in elementary and secondary education by introducing a level of  accountability into the funding process. Even though NCLB was an olive branch offered to congressional Democrats, President Bush has received tremendous criticism for the measure from the left.

The National Education Association (NEA) says that : The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001 (the latest revision of ESEA) presents real obstacles to helping students and strengthening public schools because it focuses on: punishments rather than assistance mandates rather than support for effective programs privatization rather than teacher-led, family-oriented solutions

Typically, I support anything, the NEA vehemently opposes but not in the case.

I am a Republican, I supported George W. Bush — but in this case, I am with the NEA.

I am with the NEA in opposition to No Child Left Behind, but for quite different reasons. The U.S. Department of Education website has an FAQ on NCLB. Items 1 and 8 of the FAQ summarize my objections to NCLB rather nicely.

1. The U.S. Constitution leaves the responsibility for public K-12 education with the states.   . . . 8. There are no federal education "mandates." Every federal education law is conditioned on a state's decision to accept federal program funds.

The FAQ is correct, education is not enumerated as a responsibility of the Federal Government. It is in fact a state responsibility. The idea of an Education President is a Constitutional oxymoron. Not because President Bush is doing anything wrong in regards to education, rather because the Federal Government has no business meddling in education in the first place.

There was a time when the conservative position was to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education. On the stump against President Carter in 1980, Ronald Reagan referred to the U.S. Department of education as President Carter's new bureaucratic boondoggle. Well, at least it is a bi-partisan boondoggle, because rather than eliminate or even shrink  the Department of Education, President Bush has grown it.

The FAQ number 8 is a typical Washington lie — worse, many people fall for it. NCLB may not be a mandate, but the Federal Government already has money taken from the states and the states must play along to get any of it back.

I guess it is half true, federal education funding is not part of a mandate, it is a protection racket.  What is a protection racket? Consider an example.

You own a small cafe. A gangster comes by and offers to protect you (for a price) from the recent rash of vandalism and robbery in the neighborhood. You know full well that the gangster is behind the crime wave. Even so, you pay up because  you have no choice.

The US Department of Education is like organized crime. They take your money through taxes and then require you to play along and comply with their rules before they will return it to you (minus the expense of running the bureaucracy.

As to the substance of NCLB. I like the idea of punishing schools for failure, and privatization where necessary.

I just don't like Uncle Sam doing what the Constitution says should be done in the statehouse.