President Obama and congressional leaders have vowed to take action this year on the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), most recently reauthorized and rebranded as the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. While most observers remain skeptical that everyone will actually see a signing ceremony in 2011, it does appear likely that at least…

The President's proposal to establish a Federally financed foundation to stimulate academic reform has produced interesting ideological and political alignments. (Editor)

A critique of federal education policy discusses questionable purposes, flaws in aid-dispensing mechanisms, and undue regulatory burdens and other constraints. The proper federal role in education is described, involving information dissemination, educational improvement through federal programs, compensation, and financial assistance. (CJ)

A federal secretary of education would be more like a school board chairman than he would a superintendent of schools. (Author/IRT)

This paper examines some of the difficulties faced by high schools in the United States. It outlines seven elements underlying the problems: mission confusion, the need for remediation, too large a scale, pupil motivation, obsolete notions of teaching and learning, the failure to stay abreast of issues confronting today's youth, and the…

Inspired by Thomas S. Kuhn's book "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions," this article redefines education. Under the old conception, education was viewed as a process and system, or an effort and intention. Education as newly defined changes the emphasis from inputs to outcomes. Only if the process succeeds will education have truly…

Replies to Crandall's claim that Finn had disrupted a decade of solid research in the Office of Educational Research and Improvement Office (OERI) regional educational laboratories. According to Finn, these labs have wasted taxpayers' money. Currently, states command school policy and finances, and key decision-makers are governors and…

The author, Assistant Secretary for Research and Improvement in the Department of Education, presents his views of the role federal government should take in promoting educational improvement and facilitating the successful implementation of reform proposals. Seven elements crucial to a thorough overhaul of educational systems are presented.…

Suggests that (1) the federal role in educational change is marginal and educational policies of the Reagan administration are ineffectual; and (2) while the rhetoric of Federal education policy might change, the policy itself is still governed by incrementalism and is unlikely to change in the near future. (Author/MJL)

Education policy leaders from across the political spectrum identified and evaluated four models that national standards and testing could take. These models are: (1) "The Whole Enchilada," the most direct and aggressive approach in which the federal government creates and enforces national standards and assessments, replacing the…

Discusses the proliferation of federal education programs and the many problems inherent in federal education policy. Suggestions are given to reform the federal role in education through changes in the reauthorization of the Elementary Secondary Education Act. (SLD)

Two-thirds of schoolchildren in America attend class in states with mediocre (or worse) expectations for what their students should learn. That's just one of the findings of Fordham's The State of State Standards 2006, which evaluates state academic standards. The average state grade is a "C-minus"--the same as six years earlier, even…

According to these authors, the federal government has pushed far too deeply into the routines and operations of the nation's public schools, now regulating everything from teacher credentials to the selection of reading programs. Ironically, the one way to extricate Washington from the minutiae of K-12 education is to give it more power in one…

This document presents the Educational Excellence Network's third annual report card on the progress of education reform in the United States. Despite much activity, the report assigns reform efforts for 1995-96 the overall grade of C, which is the same grade given for the previous year. Part 1 presents data on academic achievement in American…

The Reagan revolution is making profound changes in the basic assumptions that have undergirded American educational and social policy. The time has come to form a new national consensus whose unifying idea is educational quality. The declining quality of teachers poses the gravest threat to the quality of education. (MLW)