Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO): No Child Left Behind Overhaul Stalled By Politics

[alp227]

WASHINGTON -- As Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) sees it, the holdup on overhauling the nation's sweeping education law, No Child Left Behind, has little to do with education, and everything to do with politics.

"I've learned more about how schools work than how the United States Senate works," Bennet, a former superintendent of Denver's public schools, told The Huffington Post in an interview on Monday. "For the life of me, it's hard to see why we can't make progress on this."

No Child Left Behind, a federal education law introduced by George W. Bush in 2001, sets grades and standards, giving the federal government power to intervene in schools that rank poorly. The law set 2014 as a deadline for schools to achieve 100 percent proficiency in math and reading -- a goal universally described as utopian at best. Under the definition set forth by the law, 82 percent of schools are set to be classified as failing by next year, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said in March. Schools deemed to be failing face escalating consequences.

Bennet, a member of the Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee, said he saw the law's problems first hand in Denver. "We spent a lot of time thinking about how to comply with the rules and regulations around things like Title I and Title II, which took away from the time we could have spent thinking about how do we want our kids to achieve at high levels," he said.

full: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/25/education-law-overhaul-co_n_909186.html

found via; http://www.drudge.com/news/146587/82-failing-no-child-left-behind

[iwishiwas]

1. He is pretty tight with Arne. I just recall this

from the races in CO.