Everybody Else is Posting the Mitch Daniels Ed Reform Speech: Why Can't I Do It?

My mom really doesn’t have much tolerance for the “But everybody’s doing it” excuse. I’m hoping she makes an exception for this posting. What am I talking about? Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (who, today, I might add, signed into law “the nation’s largest voucher program”…. HIP, HIP, HOORAH!) gave a big education reform speech at D.C.’s American Enterprise Institute (AEI).

Not surprisingly, AEI’s education guru Rick Hess had some good things to say about the “uber-wonk” Daniels’ speech. Matthew Ladner posted the full 51-minute speech on Jay Greene’s blog with the telling observation: “Indiana 2011 stands as the best reform session since Florida 1999 in my book.” Meanwhile, for those who don’t have time for the whole speech, RedefinED’s Adam Emerson has posted a key 90-second clip:

Yes, I posted the video. After all, everybody else is doing it. Wouldn’t it be even better, though, for some other states’ governors follow Indiana’s education reform prescription and then hear them say: Well, hey, everybody else is doing it! Okay, if they listened to the speech, or even just this brief clip above, I’m sure they could come up with a better reason than that.

Daniels says the different aspects of education reform successfully adopted in the Hoosier State this year represent a “mutually reinforcing whole.” Focusing on the major new voucher program, he explains:

If the public school delivers and succeeds, no one will seek to exercise this choice. But neither will we incarcerate any family’s kid in a school that they don’t believe is working having tried it for at least one full year.

Forgive me for getting a little less wonky and a little bit more charismatic, but AMEN! Almost makes want to live in Indiana, and it’s definitely not because everybody else is doing it!