Romney's manifesto -- they read it so we don't have to

My undying gratitude to the Chronicle of Higher Education for reading Mitt Romney's new, 67-page policy booklet, titled Strategy for a Stronger America. As the Chronicle notes, Romney on Tuesday laid out policy pronouncements on "terrorism, energy independence, and child predators," but was a bit light on education.

"Romney calls for strengthening education, and, in particular, emphasizing math and science education, in order to 'ensure American workers have the intellectual capital and skills to compete in the 21st-century economy,'" the Chronicle says.

"He also says federal worker-retraining programs should be consolidated and restructured in order to better serve those seeking to learn new skills."

New York City wins Broad prize

Mayor Bloomberg took a big gamble in seizing control of New York's schools, and now the payoff matches the gamble -- the Broad award for school reform, accepted today.

Said the Mayor: Today's result demonstrates that New York City's school reforms are raising achievement among our students, particularly minority students, to levels that weren't considered possible just a few years ago, and this award recognizes the hard work of the teachers, students and parents and acknowledges that we are heading in the right direction.

Bloomberg has said he wants to held accountable for changing the school culture there. Should he decide to dive into the '08 race, this would give his reforms credibility. It certainly would raise the profile of education issues in the race.

Richard Whitmire

Democrats for Education Reform

The surprise star at last night's launch of the Democrats For Education Reform was Michelle Rhee, the new DC schools chancellor. With her humor and spunk very much intact in spite of smacking repeatedly against what may be the worst-run school central office in the entire country, Rhee regaled a crowd of about 100 national education reformers at the Hotel Washington across from the U.S. Treasury Department with fresh stories from close quarters bureaucratic combat.
One example: A DC schools bureaucrat, whose carelessness led to two special education students being assigned to expensive private providers (cost to DC: roughly $500,000 a year) nearly refused to come see Rhee. "I have to check with my supervisor."
When the bureaucrat finally arrived and was told of the expense she had inflicted on the school budget she responded, "You need to understand I am very, very busy. A few things fall between the cracks."
So what do these DC school war stories have to do with the '08 race?

With the Democratic front runners courting the liberal-liberals who are the big players in the primaries, it's easy to overlook the basics of educating kids from low-income schools, says former reporter and author Joe Williams ("Cheating our Kids: How Politics and Greed Ruin Education"), who now runs the organization.
It's time, said Williams last night, "to stand up for the little guy again" (as in, stand up to the National Education Association). In primary season, that's a tall order for Democrats. Who's going to spurn the most reliable liberal foot soldiers to be found?
The message last night, from Rhee and Chicago Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., was in-your-face civil rights rhetoric: "Children are deserving of a more perfect education," said Jackson. To him, charters are the bright option: "We need more competition in the system."
That's a message, of course, that would be hotly disputed by the NEA, which would argue that less testing and more money spent to reduce class size is the way to go, not birthing more charters and attacking union rules.
Williams and the DFER have their work cut out for them during the primaries, but the general election brings them brighter hope, right? Right?

Richard Whitmire

Obama: Give teachers more and extra pay

A sharp-eyed reader at my education blog, Get on the Bus, pointed me to this clip in which Charlie Rose asks Barack Obama for his thoughts on education that is part of a mashup on all of the candidates' positions (see previous item) on a variety of issues.

In the clip, Obama calls No Child Left Behind "false advertising," saying the U.S. Education system does well for some but not for all.

Obama goes on to say he favors bonuses for those willing to teach math and science or in inner city and rural schools. He talks up an impending teacher shortage and the need to attact new people to the profession. To do that, he says we'll have to pay them more, offer them more professional deveopment and rely on their judgement to set standards. He also says he favors universal early childhood education.

Candidate mashup

The debates and the candidates might not be paying much attention to education, but that doesn't mean the public isn't. Slate magazine, Yahoo! News and the Huffington Post joined forces to put on the first online presidential candidate mashup -- involving the Democratic ones. And one of the top three topics was education (along with the Iraq War and health care, natch).

You can watch clips of what the candidates said at Yahoo! News. You can also read a Slate synopsis of the candidates' positions on education before the mashup.

Giuliani's "spotted record"

Hizzoner didn't achieve nearly what he wanted to when it came to education, the LA Times reports this morning. Giuliani pledged to fix New York's troubled schools, the Times says, yet the district endured eight years of chaos during his term.

"He left behind an expired union contract, an army of angry teachers and a school system that by his own admission was still delivering inferior educations to hundreds of thousands of students."

The Times quotes several of Giuliani's opponents and supporters, who generally reach the same conclusion: That his combative style worked against his efforts for school reform. To read the full report, click here.

The Candidates and Higher Education

Hi everyone,

My name is Sara Hebel, and I am coordinating the 2008 election coverage for The Chronicle of Higher Education. I've agreed to occasionally cross post some items from our new blog, Campaign U.

As we start up this week, we've got a variety of items about the candidates and higher education.

One of our entries looks at some of Fred Thompson's recent comments related to higher education. As has been noted here already, the latest entrant to the 2008 race has expressed support for arming more people on college campuses. Our post links to his ABC News Radio commentary about that and about other topics, including his lament about "political correctness" at colleges and his desire for more academic programs about military history.

We've also pointed to a few indications that higher education may be developing a crush, so to speak, on Barack Obama. (So far, for instance, he's raked in more money than any other candidate from college employees, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.)

Our election page includes a rundown of the key higher-education stances of all of the presidential candidates.

I look forward to contributing to the conversation here.