The U.S. Congress is seemingly close to reauthorizing ESEA, now called the “Every Child Achieves Act.” But the current proposal is overly deferential towards Tea Party-ish members who resent the teeth of federal oversight not only in same-sex marriage but also in education policy. And, in its current people-pleasing mode, this draft of ESEA panders to teacher union loyalists whose determination to undermine any federal role in education policy was on full-frontal display at the recent NEA annual meeting. Delegates there approved three new business items that sacrifice the ability of states to accurately measure student achievement in order to protect teachers’ jobs.
But let’s not be too negative. There’s plenty to like about the Every Child Achieves Act, primarily its retention of annual state testing and disaggregation of data. However, as the Washington Post Editorial Board opines today, its passage “would mark a defeat for the nation’s neediest students”: