Tag Archives: Joel Klein

Things are changing in Washington, DC, and my friends in the Education Policy Center are wondering what the new presidential administration will mean for school reform. That’s why they agreed to publish a paper by a really smart group of people – three professors from the Department of Education Reform at the University of Arkansas. The new paper is called The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly: Will President Obama’s School Reform Bring the Change Kids Need? (PDF). The authors are Robert Maranto, Gary Ritter, and Sandra Stotsky. You really need to read this paper if you care about education and the future of America. As a candidate, Barack Obama gave a lot of different messages about education reform. The authors of The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly sort out the different competing proposals, and encourage the President-elect to “appoint a Democratic reformer who embraces the good, opposes the bad, and avoids the ugly, to serve as the nation’s next Secretary of Education.” The Fordham Institute’s Education Gadfly has its ears to the Beltway grapevine, running a daily line to see who the favorites are to fill the Cabinet-level post. The latest entry has Chicago Schools CEO Arne Duncan […]

A bunch of political leaders are getting together with new tough talk on education reform, reports the Denver Post: The national movement, called the Education Equality Project, began a little more than a month ago with [New York City education chancellor Joel] Klein and civil-rights leader Rev. Al Sharpton. In a short time, it has attracted an odd cast of bedfellows such as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, former Colorado Gov. Roy Romer and a handful of urban superintendents and pastors across the country. The group’s message: In the last generation and a half, education has become too much about serving adults. “It’s children we need to worry about,” Klein said. “Even if they graduate, they’re woefully unprepared. … Every kid should get a shot at the American dream. It’s not about politics.” Sadly, despite exceptional success stories, today’s school system is out-of-balance – shortchanging kids and families, and favoring the monopoly interests of unions and other groups. The most encouraging thing about this Post story is seeing Democrat politicians who appear willing to stand up to the teachers unions. I look forward to seeing what happens when the rubber meets the road on the […]