-Caveat Lector- ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- Date sent: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 16:48:52 -0400 Send reply to: LIST RESPECT From: Web Master <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Idea of the Week: A New Bargain for Public Schools To: Multiple recipients of list NEWDEMNEWS <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> The DLC Update Monday, September 27, 1999 ************************************************************************* Discuss the Idea of the Week at the DLC Idea Exchange at http://www.dlc.org/idea/discussion.htm ************************************************************************* ***Idea of the Week: A New Bargain for Public Schools*** Most federal aid to education has been traditionally based on an old bargain that no longer works: Washington offers money to states and school districts based on need, and then micro-manage how it is used, with little or no attention to what it produces in the way of educational results. While it has done much good to offset the financial inequities inherent in schools due to widely varying local revenue bases, it has also rewarded failure as often as success. That is why the disparities in education levels between poor and middle- or upper-class Americans--that justified federal aid to education to begin with--are getting worse, not better, at precisely the time when education and skills loom larger than ever as a factor determining individual opportunity. This year's reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA)--the primary vehicle for federal aid--offers Congress the chance to reinvent federal education policy for the Information Age. In addition, there is finally a legislative package on the horizon that would accomplish the kind of dramatic shift in strategies the country needs: DLC Chairman Sen. Joe Lieberman's (D- CT) Public Education, Reinvestment, Reinvention, and Reinvigoration Act Lieberman's "Three R's" bill (along with a House counterpart that Rep. Harold Ford (D-TN) intends to offer) is based in large part on the Progressive Policy Institute's report, Toward Performance-Based Federal Education Funding, by Andrew Rotherham, President Clinton's Special Assistant for Education Policy. In some respects, it is a more sweeping variation on the Clinton Administration's proposal to link federal education aid to accountability for educational results. It also draws on bipartisan proposals from the Governors to provide greater flexibility in administering federal education funds by consolidating a variety of programs. More fundamentally, it redefines the federal role in education and offers states and poor school districts a new bargain: strong federal support and broad administrative flexibility in exchange for a commitment to reform, innovation, and the achievement of measurable results in closing the gap between good and bad public schools. Lieberman's "Three R's" plan would: --Reconfigure the Title I compensatory education program for disadvantaged students by increasing the targeting of funds to the poorest schools, requiring steady progress toward the goal of ensuring math and reading proficiency for all children, demanding radical action to improve or close poor-performing schools, and raising overall funding by more than 50 percent. --Consolidate teacher training programs into one grant focused on raising the quality of teaching as well as the quantity of qualified teachers, with strict performance standards. --Streamline bilingual education programs while making it clear the goal of bilingual instruction is to achieve student proficiency in reading, writing, and speaking English. --Strengthen federal efforts to provide parental choice among public schools, including universal--information on school, student and teacher performance, school safety, access to technology, and physical conditions; while encouraging more performance-based "charter" schools. Consolidate all other K-12 programs into a single fund that would encourage innovation and --experimentation on a broad array of educational challenges. --Introduce a regime of accountability throughout all federal education programs that would reward success and punish failure according to simple performance measures. In effect, Lieberman's bill combines the best ideas for improving public school performance from every direction. But it does not endorse the dubious logic of Republican schemes that demand accountability without standards for public schools, and no accountability at all for private schools receiving public funds. If lawmakers in both parties believe half of what they say about the critical importance of improved education in an Information Age global economy, they should get behind Lieberman's bill as an urgent priority. ***Bad Company in Seattle*** The AFL-CIO recently announced it intends to send 15,000 members to Seattle at the end of November to participate in events surrounding the World Trade Organization (WTO) ministerial summit. The labor federation's web site outlines the need for a strong labor presence in Seattle to ensure that trade negotiators from around the world understand the need for including workers' rights in future trade liberalization efforts conducted under WTO auspices. To be sure, stirring a healthy debate over workers' rights keeps faith with a progressive vision of globalization. But we hope leaders of the labor movement also recognize the necessity of keeping their distance from the virulent anti- globalization forces marching on Seattle. The WTO talks have become the target for a truly weird international initiative to demand an immediate and unconditional halt to any discussion on liberalizing trade or investment, and then a rollback of earlier trade agreements to reverse the alleged damage to Mother Earth and her many children. A manifesto signed by approximately 1,100 organizations from 87 countries makes it abundantly clear that the "battle in Seattle" is not intended to be a calm and reasoned dialogue. "The Uruguay Round Agreements," it says, referring to the last major series of trade liberalization efforts, "have functioned principally to prize open markets for the benefit of transnational corporations at the expense of national economies; workers, farmers and other people; and the environment....We oppose any further liberalization negotiations. We commit ourselves to a campaign to reject any such proposals." Signatories include a rich broth of Marxists, anarchists, pacifists, animal-rights groups, Greens, a few trade unions, and third-world advocacy groups. The groups plan a giant bus caravan across America to Seattle, which should provide a fine autumnal diversion for the decidedly capitalist and carnivorous heartland populace along the route. More ominously, some of the fringe groups headed for Seattle seem ready for a reprise of 1960s-style guerilla street action. According to the September 20, 1999 issue of The Financial Times, "a small group of self-described 'top- flight hell-raisers' from across the country spent last weekend at a special 'Globalize This!' action camp...the aim was to fine-tune their skills in non-violent action techniques and civil disobedience so they can train others." The venerable Industrial Workers of the World (a.k.a., "Wobblies") has called for a sort of general strike to "Shut Down Sea-Town" on the day the WTO meetings begin. It's all beginning to look like last summer's "Carnival Against Capitalism" in London, which got out of hand and then violent. We are sure the U.S. labor movement does not share such loony views or loopy plans. Our hope is that their presence in Seattle will serve to spur a genuine dialogue, and not converge with a movement that wants to radicalize Seattle into a "happening" that may well wind up resembling Chicago '68 or Woodstock '99. ***With Friends Like These*** Congressional Republicans are forever telling the business community that it needs to put all its eggs into the GOP basket, foreswearing any assistance to Democrats and even firing staff people with Democratic backgrounds from every trade associations or government affairs office. "We're your friends," they say. "We'll never let you down." Next time any business executive interested in international trade gets this kind of call from a GOP fundraiser or enforcer, the caller should be asked why the trade community's "friends" in Congress went out of their way this week to deep-six any prospects for congressional action on permanent normal trade relations (NTR) for China, without even pausing to see what eventual deal U.S. trade negotiators may strike as part of China's accession to the WTO. "I don't think it's possible to get permanent NTR," said House Majority Leader Dick Armey, in a statement virtually guaranteed to undermine ongoing negotiations with China. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott cited Congress' "busy legislative schedule" in agreeing there just was no time for an NTR vote this year. Lott is also blocking action on the Africa Trade Bill and extension of the Caribbean Basin Initiative, the only other trade measures on Congress' plate. Sorry, we're just too busy. That's a howler. What, exactly, is the GOP Congress so busy with this year, other than waiting around for its leaders to figure out how to get out of the budgetary box they have constructed for themselves? Maybe they are too busy intimidating business lobbyists with demands that they support their "friends." ### -------------------------------------------- Subscribe and Unsubscribe -------------------------------------------- You may subscribe to this list at any time by sending an e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with "SUBSCRIBE NEWDEMNEWS" in the body of the message. You may leave the list at any time by sending an e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with "SIGNOFF NewDemNews" in the body of the message. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Membership is your key to unlocking doors to the DLC-PPI world of people and ideas. 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