NetRootsMass » Education

346. No Child Left Behind’s Reading First boondoggle

Hugh — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 03:54:19 +0000

Reading First is a centerpiece of George Bush’s No Child Left Behind program and $6 billion has been spent on it. Its purpose was to increase children’s understanding of what they read in grades 1-3.

A June 22, 2006 report of the Education Department’s Inspector General found rampant mismanagement and conflicts of interest. 16 panels had been set up to review applications for funding by states. These were supposed to be balanced with members from 4 designated groups (the Department of Education being but one of these). However, 15 of the 16 panels had majorities drawn from Department of Education nominees. 7 of them were made up only of them. It just happened that these panels favored one commercial product McGraw-Hill’s Direct Instruction/Reading Mastery. It also just happened that members of these panels and the Reading First program had business and academic ties to Direct Instruction.

Before coming to Reading First, then Director Chris Doherty had been responsible for bringing Direct Instruction to Baltimore schools in 1996. As Director, he was asked about stacking the review panels, he replied, “Stack the panel?’…I have never *heard* of such a thing….” In an email discussing another product, Doherty wrote, “They are trying to crash our party and we need to beat the [expletive deleted] out of them.” He also referred to them as “dirtbags”.

Despite its problems, Reading First was touted as a good program which improved the comprehension of young readers. Until now. An Institute of Education Sciences report released May 1, 2008 found “Reading First did not have statistically significant impacts on student reading comprehension test scores in grades 1-3.” I’m guessing that while Reading First didn’t help anyone, the $6 billion it cost did.

200. SCOTUS: Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School Dist. No. 1 (integration)

Hugh — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 18:01:36 +0000

On June 28, 2007, the Supreme Court 5-4 in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School Dist. No. 1 eliminated the use of racial classification to avoid racial segregation in public schools. Its version of color blindness is to ignore the effects of past discrimination. The ruling is another indication that the two Bush appointees Roberts and Alito have no intention of honoring stare decisis (respect for precedent) which they swore to uphold at their confirmation hearings. It effectively undermines the 1954 landmark decision Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka by leaving school districts few or no options to address and prevent segregation or re-segregation in their educational systems.

The pattern of the Roberts court with respect to precedent is becoming clear. Using a majority of 5 conservative judges: Roberts, Alito, Scalia, Thomas, and Kennedy, the court has embarked on a course to overturn hallmark decisions like Roe and Brown, not by direct reversal but by dismantling them piece by piece until all the meaning in them is gone. It has also sought to roll back other laws and time elsewhere as well. In doing so, its reasoning has been remarkable for its inconsistency. This is Bush’s court and with Iraq it may well be his most enduring and pernicious legacy.

104. No Child Left Behind (an uneducated President’s predictable approach to education)

Hugh — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 10:57:37 +0000

No Child Left Behind, based on flawed and false data, chronically underfunded, capricious in its evaluations, places test scores above knowledge; allegations have arisen that people at the Department of Education pushed reading programs as part of NCLB that they had financial interests in.