Obama Administration Faces Education Hurdles   Continue Reading...

This morning, AAE staff members had the pleasure of attending an American Enterprise Institute (AEI) education policy event in Washington, D.C. With the 2012 election fresh on the minds of all attendees, AEI hosted a discussion answering the question, "What will the 2012 election mean for education?"   Continue Reading...

Yesterday, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan testified before the House Education and Workforce Committee in reference to the administration's Fiscal Year 2013 budget and policy priorities for the Department of Education. The hearing was a strong indicator of areas of compromise and disagreement between the administration and congressional leadership.   Continue Reading...

Department of Education Unveils RESPECT Initiative Included in the Obama administration's 2013 proposed budget is a new $5 billion competitive program to challenge states and school districts to work with various stakeholders in an effort to comprehensively reform the field of teaching. Entitled RESPECT, the proposal seeks to touch on every aspect of teaching from training and tenure to compensation and career opportunities.

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President Obama Releases 2013 Budget

Yesterday at a community college in northern Virginia, President Obama unveiled his new budget for fiscal year 2013. The $3.8 trillion budget earmarks $69.8 billion in mere discretionary spending for the U.S. Department of Education in the next fiscal year, an increase of $1.7 billion, or 2.5 percent, over the current budget year.

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2012 marked the 10 year anniversary of the heavily debated and sometimes controversial No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law, the nation's flagship federal K-12 legislation. What began as a bi-partisan effort to track schools and measure accountability, has grown into a headache for many states who are struggling to comply with various regulations.   Continue Reading...

Education in State of the Union Address Last week, President Obama spent significant time during the State of the Union address discussing his administration's vision for American education. "Teachers matter," said President Obama in beginning his education remarks. "Instead of bashing them, or defending the status quo let's offer schools a deal. Give them the resources to keep good teachers on the job, and reward the best ones. In return, grant schools flexibility: To teach with creativity and passion; to stop teaching to the test; and to replace teachers who just aren't helping kids learn."

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NCLB Turns 10  After years of controversy, headaches in states and districts, and heated rhetoric from politicians on all sides, No Child Left Behind, the cornerstone piece of federal education legislation turned 10-years-old this week. What began as one of the nation's largest and most publicized pieces of bi-partisan legislation championed by then President George W. Bush and unlikely liberal ally, the late Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA) has produced mixed results and long delays in reform for American students and teachers.   Continue Reading...

According to a new study by the Center on Education Policy, a nonpartisan think tank based in Washington, D.C., estimates by the Obama administration regarding failure rates under No Child Left Behind (NCLB) have been grossly overstated. The research group, which often sides with the reforms touted by Department of Education and Education Secretary Arne Duncan, claim that 48 percent of the nation's 100,000 public schools will be labeled failures under current federal education law. This figure is far below the 82 percent Secretary Duncan had been mentioning for months while advocating for the department's NCLB waiver plan and congressional action.   Continue Reading...

With the debate over No Child Left Behind taking a partisan turn, Director of Education Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute Frederick Hess and Stanford Education Professor Linda Darling-Hammond penned an op-ed this week in The New York Times.   Continue Reading...

The Congressional Supercommittee & the Education Impact With the November 23 deadline looming and the failure of the congressional "supercommittee" to reach a meaningful debt-reduction agreement, automatic spending cuts are now expected for agencies across the federal government. What impact this failure will have on federal education budgets remains to be seen as states will now potentially be forced to deal with dire financial realities.   Continue Reading...

Full-Scale NCLB Overhaul Clears Senate Committee

On the heels of Senator Harkin's (D-IA) decision to ax the major teacher evaluation provision from his No Child Left Behind overhaul draft, and AAE's statement of support for educator accountability, the debate over a comprehensive bill concluded last week on Capitol Hill with a draft of a NCLB re-write clearing committee.

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Last week Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), the chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, released a large scale bill to reauthorize the current federal education law, No Child Left Behind. Working with Senator Michael Enzi (R-WY) on a bipartisan effort to retool the controversial law, the initial proposal heavily mirrored the Obama administration's long-standing blueprint for reauthorization coupled with the NCLB waiver package released last month. However, after emergency lobbying efforts by the NEA and AFT, the bill has taken a drastic turn with regard to teacher accountability, disappointing Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and other education reform groups.   Continue Reading...

Obama Administration Releases NCLB Waiver Proposal  

With reauthorization of No Child Left Behind taking much longer than expected, President Obama announced on Friday that his administration will begin to allow targeted waivers to individual states to provide regulatory relief under the current federal system with caveats to include levels of accountability.   Continue Reading...

This week marks the second annual interactive summit, Education Nation hosted by NBC news. The weeklong conference is designed to host educators, parents, policymakers, elected officials, business leaders, students and engaged citizens in facilitating a national discussion about the challenges and potential solutions spanning today's education landscape. This year's lineup of education panels kicked off yesterday with a major teacher town hall event, and is set to include sessions on teaching and testing, the brain science behind early-learning and more.   Continue Reading...

With reauthorization of No Child Left Behind taking much longer than expected, President Obama today announced that his administration will begin to allow targeted waivers to individual states to provide regulatory relief under the current federal system with caveats to include levels of accountability.   Continue Reading...

House Passes First Education Reform Bill

Last week, President Obama made a speech before a joint session of Congress to gain support for his new $447 billion jobs bill to be introduced sometime this week. Among the many new spending initiatives, the president spent significant time discussing education and increased investments in hiring new teachers and modernizing schools with improvements and technology.

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Department of Education Releases Final Guidelines for Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge

Following 2010's federal Race to the Top competitive grant program, the Department of Education has once again flagged an estimated $700 million for an additional round of state-level grants. This year, the Obama administration plans to focus the majority of the funds on the nation's youngest students with their Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge. The final guidelines of the program were released last week.

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Secretary Duncan Takes Action on NCLB 

 

With the arrival of the new school year and the President Obama-backed deadline to overhaul No Child Left Behind expiring, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced plans last week to issue accountability waivers to individual states in exchange for reforms. While the waiver plan has loomed over legislators in Congress all summer, the debt-ceiling fiasco took precedence over any meaningful progress on education. Now that legislators are home for August recess, it's clear that a congressional solution is at least months away.   Continue Reading...

With the new school year fast approaching and the President Obama-backed deadline to overhaul No Child Left Behind expiring, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced plans today to issue accountability waivers to individual states in exchange for reforms. While the waiver plan has loomed over legislators in Congress all summer, the debt-ceiling fiasco took precedence over any meaningful progress on education. Now that legislators are home for August recess, it's clear that a congressional solution is at least months away.   Continue Reading...