GOP proposes unprecedented flexibility in ed. spending
Blog by Alyson Klein/Education Week
States and districts would get unprecedented leeway to move around federal money under the latest in a series of bills to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. But the measure is already being decried by a top Democrat as a "backdoor" way to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education and as an attack on students' civil rights. The bill, introduced today by Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., the chairman of the House Education and the Workforce Committee, envisions a very different role for the federal government when it comes to telling states and districts how to spend their money. Instead of directing states and districts to spend a certain amount on a particular population—say, English-language learners—states and districts could move the dollars out of that program and spend them on a wide range of activities authorized under the ESEA (whose current version is No Child Left Behind). (more...)