Rebuilding, Part Two: Education
One of the areas where I think the Republican Party (at the state or national level) can and must rehabilitate itself is education policy.
The Bush Administration's first major domestic blunder was the No Child Left Behind act. In it, we had the worst of both worlds: the Democratic impulse to federalize or nationalize state matters, and the Republican reluctance to fund federal programs. The end result was a system of somewhat vague standards and no money to pay for it.
Rather than play the Democratic game of more federal intervention (sprinkled with the bromide of 'choice' or not), I would like to see the Republicans reclaim the philosophical ground once held in the early 1980s, when conservatives made motions to dissolve the federal Department of Education.
Why? Because it's clear that federal laws aren't the solution to the problem, they are the problem. Unfunded mandates drive up local tax rates, with the result that education becomes more costly for the local taxpayer without becoming more educational for the student. The natural impulse on the part of the local school districts (and voters) is to cut the budget, which negatively impacts education without removing the real burden of the federal mandates.
As I've said before, the first thing to do is repeal bad laws before making new ones. And there are a lot of bad laws on the books when it comes to education.
posted by Joshua @ 2:42 PM
2 Comments:
I left out the specific laws in the post itself because I didn't want to clutter the post with unnecessary detail. That's why we have comments.
In particular, I was referring to the structure and funding of special education. It's not fully funded by the federal government, so local districts are forced to pay for it. Moreover, the issues involved in "coding" students are often not strictly related to the quality of education or the student. This combination has made the work of teachers that much harder and less popular, all while not producing a better result.
What's funny in all this is that the ire of most tax-paying citizens is misdirected at the teachers themselves, as though it is they who have suddenly stopped teaching students. This is grossly unfair. In fact, given the current state of educational jurisprudence, it is an amazing tribute to teachers that anyone learns anything at all!
NCLB and its successors (and don't believe they're not coming) are only making the Gordian Knot thicker. This is why we've got to give more policy direction back to the states: let them experiment with different solutions. Some, of course, will not work. But others will, and those successful states will quickly be emulated. The flexibility employed in 50 laboratories will lead to more efficient use of taxpayer funds and better education in diverse situations.
In a related matter, I think it's unwise for Republicans to continue their mysterious fascination with the voucher system. So long as federal law places restrictive burdens on public education, there will be nothing like a level playing field between private, public, and charter education. A voucher system would exacerbate these problems and create greater inequalities.
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