Bob Herbert rants about our failing educational system and the deplorable tendency of the media to focus on minutia. Michelle Cottle of TNR tackles the meda side, so let me excerpt this from Herbert, take two quick shots, and leave.
Ignorance in the United States is not just bliss, it’s widespread. A recent survey of teenagers by the education advocacy group Common Core found that a quarter could not identify Adolf Hitler, a third did not know that the Bill of Rights guaranteed freedom of speech and religion, and fewer than half knew that the Civil War took place between 1850 and 1900.
Right. And if someone proposed an educational reform that actually emphasized basic skills and basic knowledge (sort of a "No Child Left Behind" type thing), Bob Herbert would swoon about the perils of "teaching to the test" and undermining the creativity of our children and teachers.
Well, the Federal role in education is small relative to the state and local contribution. However, I'll give you two reasons it is not a major campaign issue. First, neither Democratic candidate is ever going to say "boo" to the NEA, which ends a lot of conversations. Second, given the plight of inner-city schools, an honest Democratic Federal program of "no reforms, but more money" would amount to Barack or Hillary announcing that they were going to raise taxes on the suburban middle class to fix low-income inner-city schools. I bet that polls well.
I'm sure the candidates are exhaustive on the topic at their websites. Here are Obama, Hillary, and McCain.
Ouch, McCain's web site fails the SEO test.
Posted by: Seixon | April 22, 2008 at 05:28 PM
What is the SEO test?
Sex Education for Orgasm?
Posted by: M. Simon | April 22, 2008 at 11:23 PM