With a new administration taking up residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and George W. Bush's centerpiece No Child Left Behind Act up for reauthorization, Frederick M. Hess, director of education policy studies at AEI, and Michael J. Petrilli, vice president of national programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham
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Institute, consider the education legacy of the Bush administration in their forthcoming article "Left at the Altar." They note that the administration found common cause with progressive reformers by pursuing ambitious policies focused on narrowing achievement gaps--but often at the expense of its own conservative principles. They also find that the political environment created in the past eight years presents not only challenges, but also surprising opportunities for reform.
Petrilli and Hess will be joined at this event by Williamson M. Evers, the Bush administration's assistant secretary of education for planning, evaluation, and policy development; Dianne M. Piché, the executive director of the Citizens' Commission on Civil Rights; and Andrew J. Rotherham, the codirector of Education Sector, an education policy think tank. Hess will moderate.
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12:30 p.m.
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Registration and Luncheon
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1:00
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Presenter:
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Michael J. Petrilli, Thomas B. Fordham Institute |
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Discussants:
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Williamson M. Evers, Hoover Institution
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Dianne M. Piché, Citizens’ Commission on Civil Rights
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Andrew J. Rotherham, Education Sector
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Moderator:
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2:30
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Adjournment
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WASHINGTON, FEBRUARY 12, 2009--In early 2001,
then-president George W. Bush was focusing his presidency on domestic
policy, and his signature venture was the No Child Left Behind Act
(NCLB). Although maligned today from both right and left, NCLB
originally received overwhelming bipartisan support, passing the Senate
87-10 and the House of Representatives 381-41. The story of the
politics and political alliances that enabled NCLB--and what it
suggests about Bush's legacy on education--is as intricate and
complicated as the law itself. On February 5, AEI director of education policy studies Frederick M. Hess convened a discussion of
Bush's legacy for K-12 education, the state of NCLB, and what we might
expect for school reform in the Obama administration. The impetus for
the conversation was a recently published Policy Review article by Hess
and Michael J. Petrilli of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. In the
article, they argue that the Bush administration found common cause
with progressives by pursuing ambitious policies focused on narrowing
achievement gaps--often at the expense of conservative principles.
Hess also developed the argument in a recent Education Outlook. In its enacted form, NCLB was far different from the slim blueprint
that Bush submitted to Congress shortly after his inauguration in 2001.
Petrilli spoke about the compromises Bush made in the name of
bipartisanship and mused that Bush seemed "eager to give away the
store." Petrilli, who worked in the U.S. Department of Education during
the beginning stages of NCLB implementation, noted that certain
provisions were "totally at odds with what Bush talked about when he
said we're going to hold schools accountable and give them flexibility
in return"--and were consequently a tough sell on the ground. In the
end, Petrilli said, Bush helped to create a law that "was much more
like a Great Society program--utopian in its aspirations," especially
in its requirement that 100 percent of students score "proficiently" on
standardized tests by 2014. Andrew J. Rotherham of Education Sector, who worked on education
policy in the Clinton administration, countered that the goals of NCLB
were "eminently reasonable": "to say that states ought to be required
to get almost all kids to a level of proficiency on their own tests
[is] something that liberals and conservatives . . . should be able to
agree on." Williamson M. Evers of the Hoover Institution and Dianne M.
Piché of the Citizens' Commission on Civil Rights suggested that NCLB
reflected citizens' demands more than Bush's priorities. Evers, who was
the Bush administration's assistant secretary of education for
planning, evaluation, and policy development, explained that there was
insufficient congressional support for some of Bush's initiatives: "If
we want American students to succeed, we need a grassroots mass
movement in support of standards and accountability." A key issue underlying NCLB debates is the potential of federal
intervention to bring about school reform. Rotherham and Piché stressed
that federal involvement is essential in ensuring that states serve
disadvantaged students. "Federal intervention "can work, it has worked
to a point, and it needs to work," Piché said. Rotherham emphasized
that, historically, "every time we've seen gains for those
[disadvantaged] kids, it's come because of federal effort." Hess and Petrilli expressed much more skepticism about the
transformative potential of NCLB-style federal intervention. "The
federal government is three or four steps removed from the classroom,"
Petrilli remarked. "There are a lot of ways that states and districts
can avoid doing what the federal government wants them to do, and they
can certainly avoid doing it well." Hess acknowledged the inevitable
messiness of the legislative process, but suggested that the
conversation revealed a "fundamental intuitive divide between
progressives and conservatives" that we fail to recognize or discuss
regarding the ability of federal institutions to effect school reform
"What we're saying," Hess explained, "is that there are things that the
federal government is statutorily and constitutionally well equipped to
do"--such as ensuring transparency, providing political cover, setting
broad parameters, and creating political incentives. The NCLB-style
approach of mandating specific and overly prescriptive step-by-step
remedies regarding school operations sets us up for "massive
programmatic failures" that are then blamed on implementation but ought
to be blamed on the "unimplementable law" itself. Bush's educational legacy is also marked by his unrelenting focus on
highlighting racial gaps in public school achievement. Petrilli said
that NCLB has engendered a harmful obsession with race, with the Bush
administration employing "racially charged language" to characterize
NCLB resistance as racist. The three discussants sharply disagreed,
suggesting that highlighting racial achievement gaps was one of the
law's most important contributions. Rotherham remarked, "I think that
an obsession with race is actually a good thing when you look at the
data that we have." Evers spoke about the need to combat "institutional
racism in education." Piché remarked that today the racial achievement
gap is "in the consciousness of the public, it's in the consciousness
of parents, of voters, and most importantly of teachers in the school
systems." She deemed the Bush administration's efforts to bring
attention to the racial achievement gap a "tremendous contribution" and
perhaps the most laudable part of his legacy. --ROSEMARY KENDRICK For video, audio, and event information, visit www.aei.org/event1872. For more information about AEI's Education Policy Studies program, including its recent book No Remedy Left Behind, visit www.aei.org/education. For media inquiries, contact Veronique Rodman at vrodman@aei.org or 202.862.4870. ###
Speaker biographies
Williamson M. Evers is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and member of the Institution’s Koret Task Force on K-12 Education. Previously, he served in the George W. Bush administration in a variety of roles from 2007 until 2009, including as the U.S. assistant secretary of education for planning, evaluation, and policy development and as a senior adviser to the secretary of education. From 2005 through 2006, he served on the Mathematics and Science Scientific Review Panel of the Institute of Education Sciences. From July to December 2003, he served in Iraq as a senior adviser for education to Administrator L. Paul Bremer of the Coalition Provisional Authority. In 2001 he served on the National Educational Research Policy and Priorities Board. Mr. Evers is the editor of and a contributor to a number of books on education policy, including Testing Student Learning, Evaluating Teaching Effectiveness (Hoover Institution Press, 2004) and School Accountability: An Assessment by the Koret Task Force on K-12 Education (Hoover Institution Press, 2002), and has written opinion columns that have appeared in Education Week, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Christian Science Monitor.
Frederick M. Hess is a resident scholar and director of education policy studies at AEI and an executive editor of Education Next. At AEI, he studies a wide range of educational issues including entrepreneurship, urban education, accountability, choice and charter schooling, governance, philanthropy, collective bargaining, and teacher and administrative licensure. His many books include When Research Matters (Harvard Education Press, 2008), Footing the Tuition Bill (AEI Press, 2007), No Child Left Behind: A Primer (Peter Lang, 2006), Educational Entrepreneurship (Harvard Education Press, 2006), Common Sense School Reform (Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), Revolution at the Margins (Brookings Institution Press, 2002), and Spinning Wheels (Brookings Institution Press, 1998). His work has appeared in both popular and scholarly publications, including the Harvard Educational Review, Social Science Quarterly, American Politics Quarterly, the American Journal of Education, the Chronicle of Higher Education, Education Week, Phi Delta Kappan, the Washington Post, and National Review. Mr. Hess is a faculty associate of the Harvard University program in education policy and governance, a board member for StandardsWork, and serves on the review board for the Broad Prize in Urban Education. He is a former high school teacher and has taught at Harvard University, Georgetown University, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Virginia.
Michael J. Petrilli is the vice president for national programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, where he oversees the research projects and publications, including The Education Gadfly. He is also a research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, an executive editor of Education Next, and a contributor to Fordham’s “Flypaper” blog. Mr. Petrilli is the coauthor of No Child Left Behind: A Primer (Peter Lang, 2006). His work has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Education Next, Education Week, The Public Interest, and other publications. Previously, he served as the associate assistant deputy secretary in the Office of Innovation and Improvement at the U.S. Department of Education. In that role, he oversaw approximately two dozen discretionary grant programs supporting such programs as alternative teacher certification and charter schooling and helped to implement the No Child Left Behind Act. Before working at the Department of Education, he was the vice president of community partnerships at K12, an online education company. He started his career as a teacher at the Joy Outdoor Education Center in Clarksville, Ohio.
Dianne M. Piché is the executive director of the Citizens’ Commission on Civil Rights and a lawyer with over twenty years of experience in litigation, policy development, and advocacy in the areas of civil rights, school reform, and educational opportunity. She is an expert on Title I and federal education law and has developed many of the reforms that were included in the Improving America’s Schools Act of 1994 and the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001. Over the past decade, Ms. Piché has edited or authored seven studies on Title I implementation and the federal role in educating disadvantaged children. She has advised former education secretary Margaret Spellings and President Barack Obama’s transition team on a range of NCLB challenges. Currently, Ms. Piché is a senior member of the legal team representing the Connecticut NAACP and low-income parents as defendant-intervenors in Connecticut v. Spellings, a case challenging states’ obligations to comply with NCLB’s requirements for assessment and accountability. Early in her career, Ms. Piché was an adviser on school finance to the late Augustus Hawkins (D-CA) on the Education and Labor Committee. She also served on the staff of Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources for Senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA).
Andrew J. Rotherham is the cofounder and codirector of Education Sector, a national education policy think tank. He writes the award-winning blog Eduwonk.com, which an Education Week study cited as among the most influential information sources in education today. Mr. Rotherham also writes a regular column for U.S. News & World Report. In addition, he serves on the Virginia Board of Education, a position he was appointed to by then-governor Warner in 2005. Previously, he served in the White House as the special assistant to the president for domestic policy during the Clinton administration. Mr. Rotherham is the author of more than 100 articles, book chapters, articles, papers, and op-eds about education policy and politics and is the author or co-editor of four influential books on educational policy. He serves on advisory boards and committees for a variety of organizations including The Broad Foundation, Harvard University, and the National Governors Association. Mr. Rotherham is also a trustee of the Cesar Chavez Public Charter High School for Public Policy and a member of the board of directors for the Indianapolis Mind Trust and Democrats for Education Reform.
