RiShawn Biddle doesn't think much of Rick Perry on education issues:

Earlier this year, Dropout Nation took time to examine Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry's record on school reform and found that he couldn't hold a candle to his predecessors, Anne Richards and George W. Bush, in that arena. With slower declines in functional illiteracy than more-aggressive reform states such as Florida (including a mere six-point decline in the percentage of fourth graders reading Below Basic on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, versus Florida's 20-point drop), Perry had done little more during his tenure than mouth off against federal education policy, spar with the Obama administration over its Race to the Top initiative, and betray his movement conservative credentials by continually accepting federal education funding and complaining about being held accountable for the spend.

…As Washington Examiner columnist Tim Carney has shown, Perry has proven to be something of a crony capitalist wolf in movement conservative clothing. He's also proven to be lackluster on education too — and it doesn't take U.S, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan engaging in campaign rhetoric to make this clear. Foes of Common Core and conservative reformers in general should think twice before embracing Perry as a standard-bearer.

-----------------

Rick Perry's School Reform Problem

August 18, 2011 No Comments by RiShawn Biddle

http://dropoutnation.net/2011/08/18/rick-perrys-school-reform-problem/