Education in ’08 Has a Place in Heaven

Ed in 08 is no longer with us, and neither — for the most part — was education in last night’s presidential debate. (Although Obama did earn the distinction of being the only candidate to utter the word “education,” as far as I could tell, saying it is his no. 3 domestic priority, behind energy independence and healthcare.)

What I expect to hear from education experts and advocates is that the absence of education talk is a bad thing. But last night in checking around I detected another sentiment in addition to the usual grumbling. Call it a grassroots “No Ed in 08” movement. “To tell the truth I get nervous when the feds start to talk about education. Lately they haven’t been much help,” a New York City parent advocate e-mailed me, expressing what seemed like embarassed relief. Diane Ravitch and Deborah Meier, who started off as an odd couple, may have kicked off this new hands-off push last month at a Fordham debate . The question was, Should the federal role in education be enlarged? A person who was there (I wasn’t) summarized Ravitch and Meier’s position: “No.” Their argument: “Feds should supply new funding for pre-K, afterschool, healthcare for kids, nutriition, etc. but GET out of the classroom.”

~ Guest blogger Elizabeth Green

6 Replies to “Education in ’08 Has a Place in Heaven”

  1. I’ll put in 10 of my own dollars to the first person to create a web site/viral video kicking this off.

  2. So we want no Ed in ’08 from the feds, but we want Eli Broad to lay hands on us? Bring in our superintendent? Evaluate us for prizes?
    Maybe we should rethink.

  3. I couldn’t help noticing the Ed in 08 posters being waved enthusiastically behind Chris Matthews last night before the debate. It seemed like a lot of trouble to go through for a defunct organization.

    I recall their edublogger summit, held on school days, thus pretty much precluding participation of working teachers.

  4. Between NCLB, the inside-the-beltway- think tanks where you can no longer tell left from right and who argue that all we need is more and more testing, charter schools, and the death of the teachers union , and the efforts of the Billionaire boys club –Broad and Gates — to hijack public education system as we know it, the best thing that could happen is if all these guys went away and left us alone.

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