Federal Government and Education

Hello,
I am Bonnie. Tamara explained well on our first post the purpose of this blog. I can also be described as a conservative who believes that limited government preserves freedom. I am also an active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints. My faith does influence how I assess the issues of the day, and it is important to me that the reader knows that. I anticipate learning much as we pursue truth and facts and share them. I am hopeful this will help me to be a more informed and productive citizen of this great land.

Tamara has chosen to explore appropriations. I would like to explore the failed policies of the Bush administration. This phrase was used time and again during this year’s political campaign. What are these policies and why are they considered failures? I found a listing of bills President Bush signed and those he vetoed if you are interested.
http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/List-of-George-W.-Bush-legislation-and-programs.

I will begin by addressing the highly criticized “No Child Left Behind” (NCLB) legislation of 2002. The development and passage of this legislation was a largely bipartisan effort encouraged and supported by President Bush.

In researching this issue, I learned that NCLB has been defined by many educators as a failure because of the many unintended negative consequences it has produced. In contrast, U.S.Secretary of Education, Margaret Spelling, recently presented compelling data showing substantial improvement in student learning because of this legislation. www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2009/01/01082009.html

How are we to understand the conflicting data? How does the bias of the researchers impact data collection and their conclusions?

These are good questions, however as it is with most government programs, there are good outcomes and bad outcomes depending on your political persuasion. Rather than argue over the merit of the program, I would rather explore whether NCLB and other legislation regarding education is supported by the constitution and how these findings might impact future legislative discussions and decisions.

In 1787, The Bill of Rights was passed by the first Congress of the new United States with no mention of public school or education. The Tenth Amendment states that the powers not delegated to the Federal Government are reserved to the States, respectively or to the poeple. Thus, the assumption can be made that education becomes a function of the State or the people rather than of the Federal Government. However, over time legislation passed (i.e. The National Defense Education Act (NDEA) 1957, The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) 1965, The Education of All Handicapped Children Act (PL94-142) 1975 later to become Public Law 101-476: The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) 1980), and Supreme Court decisions taken (i.e. Plessy v Ferguson & Brown v Brown) have essentially given the Federal Government this authority and greatly expanded its role culminating in the creation of the United States Department of Education in 1979 and NCLB in 2002.

From these facts one can surmise that individuals or groups determined that state and local education departments were not performing adequately and/or addressing needs as they ought therefore these individuals or groups turned to the Federal Government through their legislators seeking more power and resources. This conclusion leads to some key questions: Does the Constitution give the the Federal Government authority to make policy for the states to adhere and therefore is NCLB even constitutional? Is it consititutional for the Federal Government to create a Department of Education? Did Supreme Court Decisions regarding civil rights delegate power to the Federal Government regarding education? Is education a civil right? Who were the individuals or groups that determined that state and local education departments were not performing adequately.

I look forward to answering these and other questions in my next blog. A few other facts I am going to to consider as I think about these questions: In 1930, there were 200,000 school boards in the United States compared to 15, 000 today. At that time, one of every 500 citizens sat on a school board; today it's one out of 20,000. (Meier, et. al, 2004) At the creation of the United States Department of Education, the budget was 20 billion. Today is is over 60,000 billion.

Meier, D., Khon, A., Darling-Hammond, L., Sizer.T., & Wood, G. (2004). Many Children Left Behind. Boston, MA: Beacon Press

Bonnie