Bipartisanship in education policy is a process, not a prize
Letter by Amina Luqman-Dawson, Petersburg, Va./Washington Post
Bipartisanship in education reform? Not so fast. Given languishing health-care reform, jobs-bill wrangling and the filibuster shadow cast on Congress, it's easy to mistakenly consider bipartisanship the prize instead of the process. Public education has been susceptible to this kind of thinking. No Child Left Behind (NCLB), with its testing mandates and punitive policies bemoaned today, was passed with healthy bipartisan support in 2002. Public education is tricky and deceptively hard. Many policy ideas sound good: more pay for good teachers, more school choice, more money. With Republicans not wanting to be labeled "obstructionists" and Democrats wanting to get something done, it's easy to imagine public education becoming a political olive branch. (more...)