NCLB Quote of the Week Issue

Some great quotes on the NCLB debate from the latest issue of Mike Antonucci's Education Intelligence Agency Communique (www.eiaonline.com <http://www.eiaonline.com> ).  Quote #1 captures perfectly why I think Jonathan Kozol is a crackpot and a menace to the very children he wants desperately to help.  And sad to see that Bill Richardson has joined the anti-NCLB bandwagon.  Kudos to DFER board member Dianne Piché!

NCLB Quote of the Week  Issue

With the U.S. House Committee on Education and Labor holding hearings on the "Miller/McKeon Discussion Draft of ESEA Reauthorization," and with everyone and his brother being called in to testify, and with opinions flying faster than an SR-71, it only seems proper to devote this week's communiqué to the most quotable NCLB quotes of the  week.
 
In no particular order:

* "This morning, I am entering the 67th day of a partial fast that I began early in the summer as my personal act of protest at the vicious damage being done to inner-city children by the federal education  law No Child Left Behind, a racially punitive piece of legislation that Congress will either renew, abolish, or, as thousands of teachers pray, radically revise in the weeks immediately ahead."  Author Jonathan Kozol.  (September 10 The  Huffington Post    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-kozol/why-i-am-fasting-an-expl_b_63622.html> )
 
* "Money." - Maria  Meza de la Vega, superintendent of the Ravenswood City Elementary School  District in California, when asked "How would you fix No Child Left Behind?"  
(September 9 San Francisco  Chronicle  http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/09/09/MNVPS0GDN.DTL> )
 
* "I have a one-point plan for No Child Left Behind: Scrap it." New Mexico Gov. Bill  Richardson.
 (September 7 USA Today   http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20070907/cm_usatoday/opposingviewnclbfailsourschools> )

* "The country's largest teachers' union, the  politically powerful National Education Association, would like to see the law gutted. Fortunately, the chairman of the House education committee, George  Miller, Democrat of California, has resisted those pressures."  New York Times editorial board.  
(September 7 New  York Times   http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/07/opinion/07fri1.html?hp> )
 
* "The  Constitution gives the federal government no authority whatsoever in education. The results of NCLB prove how wise the Founding Fathers were to keep the federal government out of schools."  Neal McCluskey, education policy analyst at the Cato Institute.
(September 6 Cybercast News Service   http://www.cnsnews.com/news/viewstory.asp?Page=/Politics/archive/200709/POL20070906a.html> )
 
* "NCLB's remedy provisions bear all the marks of concessions to various ideologies, advocates,  and interest groups, with scant attention paid to how they fit together, the  resources or authority they require, or whether they could be sensibly deployed through the available machinery."  Frederick M. Hess of the American  Enterprise Institute.
(September 4 FrontPage Magazine    http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=14E3B112-04EA-4322-B888-B99CEE51AB39> )
 
* "Suggesting that NCLB 1.0 is flawed because it did not explicitly provide, back in 2001, for 'growth models' is like saying my 2001 desktop was a bad buy because in 2007 it can't run Windows Vista or streaming video. Virtually none of the states had the technology and other capacity to design and implement  growth-measurement systems in the early years of this authorization."  Dianne Piché, executive director of the Citizens' Commission on Civil Rights.
(Fall 2007 Education Next   http://www.hoover.org/publications/ednext/9223561.html> )
 
* "But letting schools off the hook is not the answer. Nor is letting them go their own way.  Instead of multiple measures, the discussion should be about national  measures."  Washington Post  editorial board. (September 10 Washington Post   http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/09/AR2007090901404.html> )
 
* "Finally, we must do everything possible to place a highly qualified teacher in every classroom by providing financial incentives to teachers in the most difficult schools and expanding professional development opportunities."  Reg Weaver,  president of the National Education Association.
(September 10 Washington Post   http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/09/AR2007090901247_2.html> )
 
* "I cannot claim to be a good teacher simply because I have a master's in education, two licenses and eight years of experience. I can claim to be a good teacher only if the data demonstrate that my students have learned." Jason Kamras, 2005 National Teacher of the Year.
(September 10 Washington Post   http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/09/AR2007090901247_5.html> )
 
Finally, not even  death can silence opinions on NCLB:
 
* "No one can say for sure, but having spent the past several years researching and writing a  biography of Shanker, I believe he would have backed the basic thrust of No  Child Left Behind  -- greater resources in return for greater accountability -- but would have fought to change several of the federal law's deviations from his original vision for standards-based reform."  Richard D. Kahlenberg,  author of Tough Liberal, a  biography of the late American Federation of Teachers President Al Shanker.  
(September 5 Education Week   http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2007/09/05/02kahlenberg.h27.html> )