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Think you've mastered the policy positions of Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain? Could you match the right education quote with the right candidate? Find out by playing this new interactive, online game created by our web gurus here at EdWeek.

And while you're at it, EdWeek also has broken down the 90-minute debate on Oct. 21 between the candidates' education advisers, and the post-debate analysis afterwards, into shorter video clips that you can find here. This multimedia page also features a transcript of the debate.

Posted by Michele McNeil at 9:53 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

From EdWeek reporter and guest blogger Dakarai I. Aarons:

The Council of the Great City Schools has joined the fray over the upcoming election.

The Washington-based organization that represents 66 of the nation’s largest urban school districts has written an open letter to the next American president, asking the nation’s next leader to commit to making American urban education the world’s best.

The council, which will hold its annual conference this week in Houston, gave the future president 10 areas to focus on. Michael D. Casserly, the council’s executive director, plans to discuss the letter during a Wednesday press conference. Veteran journalist Dan Rather will moderate a Friday panel during the council’s conference on education and the next president that will include Lisa Graham Keegan, senior education adviser to Republican nominee Sen. John McCain, and Pedro Noguera, one of the many education advisers to Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama.

Among the priorities in the letter are a national set of education standards that are globally competitive. A “positive tone” is also sought in discussing public education, because the council says urban schools are often singled out with “divisive and destructive rhetoric,” rather than constructive attempts to find solutions.

The council’s members are lobbying for changes to the federal No Child Left Behind Act—a law the council supports—to include more funding and better research about what works to accompany the focus on accountability.

“No Child Left Behind was an important effort ... but it devolved into a poorly calibrated exercise in compliance with overly rigid and punitive measures that failed to take academic progress or growth into account and ultimately had little to do with raising achievement or narrowing achievement gaps,” the council's letter says.

Part of that funding should go to helping school districts attract and retain high-quality teachers to meet the goals of NCLB provisions that govern teacher quality, the council writes.
The letter also urges federal support for boosting early childhood education options, research on finding strategies to reduce high school dropout rates, and giving federal dollars to school districts to help replace “crumbling” school facilities.

A President McCain or Obama should also spend more federal dollars on educating poor students, English-language learners, and special education students, the council says. Urban schools tend to educate more of these students than their suburban peers, yet tend to have less funding with which to work with such high-need populations, the letter says.

The new president should also make U.S. Department of Education appointments that include educators with experience in urban school districts as well with ethnic and cultural diversity that reflects the changing demographics of many American schools. The letter goes on to say:

The Great City Schools are on record in support of raising student achievement, closing achievement gaps, and being accountable for results. We will continue to support these priorities, even when the challenges appear immense and success seems out of reach. We do so because we have seen these schools make progress and know that more is possible. It is vital that we succeed, given that our fortunes are tied inextricably with those of the nation and our urban children. We ask you, as the next president of the United States, to work with us to make urban public education the best in the world. Thank you and best wishes as you assume the mantle of leadership as the 44th president of the United States of America.

Posted by Michele McNeil at 7:39 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

It seems Sen. John McCain is not backing away from his widely debunked education ad attacking Sen. Barack Obama's record on education.

The Republican presidential nominee told National Public Radio yesterday that the ad was accurate. Here's the exchange:

NPR: Have you come back to your advisers at any point and said — for example, the ad that ran with your name on it saying that Barack Obama supported comprehensive sex education for primary school students, something that factcheck.org said was wrong. Have you ever gone to your staff and said, "Take that ad off. It's not right"?

McCain: It's factually correct. It's absolutely factually correct, and you can go on my Web site and you can see the exact language of the bill that Senator Obama sponsored. ... And if someone named factcheck.org or anybody else doesn't agree with it, I respectfully disagree with their conclusions.

Here's a link to Edweek's analysis of the ad, and to the bill itself.

The long and short of it is that the Democratic nominee was not the main sponsor of the measure, although he did vote to support it. The bill, which ultimately did not pass, would have authorized comprehensive, age-appropriate sex education for students in grades K-12. Parents could opt out of that instruction. Obama said during his U.S. Senate race that the lessons for kindergartners would have been aimed at helping kids avoid sexual predators.

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Even in the face of a federal bailout of the financial services industry that could cost $700 billion, Sen. Barack Obama strongly suggested in tonight's debate that he would not want education to be sacrified because of it.

Moderator Jim Lehrer's question, which focused on how the uber-expensive bailout would affect their proposals, allowed the candidates to stake out their budget priorities. Sen. John McCain said he would further rein in spending--a spending freeze his advisers have said applies to education. Obama said some things would suffer, but not energy independence, health care, education, and electricty infrastructure.

Specifically, Obama--who listed education third in his list of priorities--said: "We have to make sure our children are competing in math and science." In addition, he said college must be affordable. In all, he wants to spend an additional $18 billion on education.

And a little later, Obama said he would prefer to see more investments in early education rather than subsidies to private companies that participate in Medicare.

Obama's answer tonight seems to put to rest--at least for now--the good question my co-blogger Alyson posed earlier this week in her post: "Would Bailout Affect Obama's Education Spending Plan?" Of course, making a promise in a debate and following through as president are two different things.

Posted by Michele McNeil at 11:30 PM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

Sen. Barack Obama wants to spend $2 billion to eliminate the international "education gap" by 2015, which is, incidentally, one year after all American kids are supposed to be proficient in reading and math under NCLB.

In a speech he gave today via satellite to the Clinton Global Initiative, he said: "Above all, we must do our part to see that all children have the basic right to learn. There is nothing more disappointing than a child denied the hope that comes with going to school, and there is nothing more dangerous than a child who is taught to distrust and then to destroy."

Obama's pledge of $2 billion almost seems like a drop in the bucket as Congress considers a $700 billion plan to bailout the troubled financial markets.

In announcing this effort, Obama is borrowing from Sen. Hillary Clinton's Education for All Act, first introduced in 2004. (Obama gave her credit in his speech, calling her a "true champion for children.") Then, she estimated that the cost of universal, basic education for children throughout the world at $5 billion to $10 billion a year. As a presidential candidate, she proposed spending $3 billion a year by 2012.

2015, by the way, is the goal set by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization to achieve universal free education worldwide. According to UNESCO, an estimated 72 million children worldwide were out of school in 2005, down from 96 million in 1999. Girls account for a large portion of those numbers: 66 percent of out-of-school children in South and West Asia were girls.

When Sen. John McCain addressed the meeting in New York earlier this morning, he didn't mention education, although he did pledge to lead the world in improving child and maternal health.

Posted by Michele McNeil at 11:45 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

Voter registration efforts are a key piece of many campaigns. Consider the decision by Barack Obama's campaign to have him accept his nomination at Invesco Field in Denver, packed by 80,000 people—many from the swing state of Colorado. He got more than just cheers—his campaign also got those folks' contact information for voter registration and get-out-the-vote efforts because they had to provide it in exchange for the ticket.

So it may be no small thing for the National Head Start Association and the League of Women Voters to mount a voter registration drive at the 2,600 Head Start programs across the country, which has the potential to reach the parents of 1 million children.

The voter-registration drive is permitted by language in the legislation signed in December 2007 that reauthorized Head Start. The national Head Start folks, in a press release announcing the voter drive, said: "The specific provision allows 'nonpartisan organizations' to use Head Start facilities 'during hours of operation . . . to increase the number of eligible citizens who register to vote in elections for Federal office'."

The release went on to say that these voter efforts are also supported by Congress through the intent of the Motor Vehicle Registration Act, which increases access to voter registration opportunities for in "locations accessible to disenfranchised populations."

This voter-registration drive—if it is executed—is nonpartisan but would likely help Barack Obama, because Head Start centers typically serve low-income, urban, and Democratic areas. Plus, Obama's education plan calls for boosting funding for Head Start and quadrupling the number of children in Early Head Start (for kids ages zero to three). Sen. John McCain's early education plan, however, doesn't call for an expansion of Head Start that isn't already in law.

Posted by Michele McNeil at 10:55 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

The controversial attack ad John McCain launched against his Democratic opponent—which says Sen. Barack Obama's one accomplishment is a bill that would have taught sex ed to kindergartners—has been labeled dishonest, misleading, and off-base by many newspapers and fact-checking web sites.

But that didn't stop former New York City Mayor Giuliani, representing the McCain campaign, from defending the ad on Sunday's Meet the Press, even declaring the ad gave Obama too much credit. And Giuliani takes a line from the ad: "Education Week said that he basically had no record on education, which is why maybe Senator McCain's idea of an accomplishment in that ad goes a little bit too far." (The link takes you to page 3 of the transcript, and scroll down about one-quarter of the way to see the EdWeek reference.)

No, not quite. As we've detailed on this blog, the McCain campaign and its supporters continue to cherry-pick a quote and take it out of context.

Writer and fellow blogger David Hoff wrote: "In his eight years in the state Senate and two years in the U.S. Senate, Mr. Obama hasn’t made a significant mark on education policy." But he also wrote in the next sentence: "In Illinois, his biggest accomplishments were in reforming state ethics rules and capital punishment. He did promote early-childhood initiatives that advocates considered 'innovative and progressive'."

And EdWeek has said plenty else about his education policies besides this one story back in 2007.

EdWeek has also examined the record and proposals about John McCain, and has pointed out that McCain's track record on education isn't anything to write home about either.

Posted by Michele McNeil at 9:03 AM | Permalink | No Comments | TrackBacks (0)

So Sen. John McCain has some ideas for pre-K that are sure to generate broad support in Congress ... because lawmakers have already passed them.

On his campaign Web site, McCain said he thinks that there should be "Centers for Excellence" for Head Start programs to hold out certain programs as models for best practices.

While there are some excellent Head Start centers that can serve as models for leadership and best practices, far too many Head Start centers have fallen prey to the same institutional flaws that have undermined the larger public education system. They lack quality instructors; they lack accountability to parents; and they are focused on process, not outcomes. We should build Centers for Excellence in Head Start that actually leads to excellence in all of the pre-K and early learning programs that taxpayers support.

McCain's colleagues in Congress obviously agree with the idea, since they included the Centers for Excellence in the Head Start reauthorization that President Bush signed into law last fall.

So ... way to go out on a limb and think outside the box there, senator. Still, an advocate told me that the fact that McCain has proposed the Centers for Excellence means he would probably provide funding for them.

But some of McCain's other proposals aren't likely to be as popular because lawmakers have already dissed them, again during the years-long debate over Head Start reauthorization.

McCain's plan says that federally supported programs--including Head Start--must use "meaningful, measurable standards designed to determine that students are ready for school by measuring their school readiness skills."

That sounds suspiciously similar to the National Reporting System, a Bush administration initiative to test Head Start students. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle said the test wasn't fair, in part because it's tough to design assessments to measure learning outcomes for kids that young. Lawmakers got rid of the tests during the reauthorization, over the administration's objections.

It makes me wonder if McCain was too busy campaigning for president to pay attention to the Head Start renewal. Neither he nor Sen. Barack Obama showed up for the final vote on the bill (it passed the Senate 95-0 anyway).

But one part of McCain's pre-K plan could lead to a big change that won kudos from an advocate. McCain's plan implies that he'd like to see Head Start and other pre-K instructors receive pay that's comparable to their K-12 counterparts with similar education levels. The advocate said equal pay and benefits for pre-K teachers could go a long way to improving program quality.

But the advocate was also dismayed that the McCain campaign's language seems to suggest that the $25 billion the federal government spends on pre-K is sufficient. Many Head Start and other federally funded programs serve a relatively small percentage of eligible kids, the advocate said.

Meanwhile, in case you were curious, McCain's running mate on the Republican ticket, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, isn't a huge supporter of state-financed pre-K plans. (Not sure yet what she thinks about federal ones).

During her 2006 gubernatorial race, Palin came out against creating a state-financed pre-K system, saying that the private sector was already doing a good job of providing services.

Posted by Alyson Klein at 3:15 PM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

A day after this blog took issue with Sen. John McCain's new ad, which hits Barack Obama on a committee vote he cast five years ago on sex ed while in the Illinois State Senate, two big newspapers are agreeing with us.

The Washington Post declares that his ad is "dishonest, deceptive." In the ad, the McCain campaign pulls out a quote from an Education Week story from early 2007 that says Obama hasn't made a "signficiant mark" on education. The Post correctly points out that the EdWeek story, however, was "generally favorable" to Obama and detailed his grassroots efforts while in the Illinois legislature, and his push for early education. The Post also takes issue with the attribution of two other statements in the ad—that's he's been "elusive" on accountability and that he's defending the "public school monopoly." These come from opinion pieces in The Post and the Chicago Tribune, but you wouldn't know that if you're not closely paying attention because the attribution quickly flashes on screen. "A casual viewer or listener could easily get the impression that all the quotes came from Education Week," The Post said.

The Post further wrote:

It implies that its critique of the Democratic presidential nominee has been endorsed by the nonpartisan journal Education Week, when in fact it is a hodgepodge of quotes from a variety of sources stitched together to form a highly partisan political attack.

Meanwhile, the New York Times finds in its "Check Point" feature that McCain's ad "distorts Obama's policy." The Times essentially says that the ad distorts the coverage of Education Week, saying:

The same publication has also criticized Mr. McCain, in language that was perhaps even stronger. Early this year, in an article titled “John McCain Where Art Thou?” it complained that he offered “a laundry list of fairly vague answers” on how to improve schools and did not make education a priority.

“McCain is a campaign-finance, foreign-relations, anti-abortion, tax-cut candidate,” the magazine said. “Education is not his thing. Depending on your perspective, McCain’s relative silence on education may be a good thing. If you think the federal government has grossly overreached into the state business of education, then he may be your guy.”

But a little fact-checking of the fact-checkers finds one flaw with the New York Times: they elevate my mere blog post to an "article." "The publication" didn't write those words—I did. As a reporter who writes both blog posts and "articles," I can assure you there's a big difference. My blog posts have a lot of voice in them as I strive to bring perspective and attention to the issue of education in this election year. They're short, written in sometimes a few minutes' time, and are part of an ongoing dialogue and back-and-forth about the issue of education—and need to be taken in that context. Our stories are far more heavily edited, are much more comprehensive, and don't take on the same voice as our individual blog posts do.

Posted by Michele McNeil at 10:46 AM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

Sen. John McCain has not let Sen. Barack Obama's attack ad on education go unanswered.

And he's hit back hard. (I've pasted the video below.)

The commercial slams Obama for not making a "significant mark" on education, for being "elusive" on accountability, and defending the "public school monopoly." And then there's the kicker: The ad says Obama's one accomplishment is "legislation to teach comprehensive sex education to kindergartners" before they learn to read.

The ad, in effect, singles out a vote Obama cast a member of an Illinois state legislative committee, which approved a bill that would allow schools to teach sex ed to students younger than 6th grade.

And, if you caught the first two words of the commercial, you'll see that it cites Education Week for declaring that Obama "hasn't made a significant mark on education." Of course, there's more to the story than that, and you can read David Hoff's entire piece from 2007, early in the Democratic primary race, here.

The Obama campaign, meanwhile, has decried the ad as "shameful."

Posted by Michele McNeil at 9:50 PM | Permalink | 3 Comments | TrackBacks (0)