Posted on the NYT website a few minutes ago is a new article reporting Obama's speech to the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. In it, he addressed educational policies with more directness than in other recent speeches.
He also defended against the "he's doing too many things at once" meme that has been TradMed prevalent this week.
Here are the details on the Obama-Duncan education plan...
The NYT Report of the speech:
The Times calls this
the first major education speech Mr. Obama delivered since taking office seven weeks ago.
In it, he repeats the goal of having every American adult achieve some sort of post-secondary education.
That goal would be measurable by having the highest proportion of college graduates in the world by 2020.
He also challenged teachers' unions to accept merit pay provisions and increased federal support of charter schools, which the President referred to as "laboratories of innovation."
The Details from the Speech Itself:
Obama went straight at the naysayers who loudly argue that he should only focus on stabilizing the banking system and that everything else is backburner material with this money quote:
I know there's some who believe we can only handle one challenge at a time. And they forget that Lincoln helped lay down the transcontinental railroad and passed the Homestead Act and created the National Academy of Sciences in the midst of civil war. Likewise, President Roosevelt didn't have the luxury of choosing between ending a depression and fighting a war; he had to do both. President Kennedy didn't have the luxury of choosing between civil rights and sending us to the moon. And we don't have the luxury of choosing between getting our economy moving now and rebuilding it over the long term.
And, I liked this one, too:
The source of America's prosperity has never been merely how ably we accumulate wealth, but how well we educate our people.
There is a listing of how our system is not measuring up to those of other countries, which I could post here, but I choose not to. That horse has been beaten a lot lately, and I'm more interested in what he talked about today to lead us out of that situation than I am in wallowing in it right now.
First, he calls on states to devise early learning programs of excellence. How do you propose to prepare the young children in your state for success in kindergarten? Those who answer that question to the satisfaction of Arne Duncan (apparently, the procedure is not outlined, but implied) will receive new grant money to support its proposal(s).
He also calls for world-class standards that will make American children competitive with their 8th-grade classmates in Singapore, Norway, and Switzerland (among others). If we were to align our 8th-grade curriculum to that standard, our children would be doing classwork that is now being done by our 10th graders, by the way. That will take some money, and a rethinking of education by the American people, no matter what way we slice it. This has been advocated by adviser Linda Darling-Hammond for some time, and is seen as a solution to the basement or low-ball standards of NCLB. I tend to agree. But we will have to drag people kicking and screaming to this new world-level standard because we don't want to think of ourselves as below standard. That self-realization will be the greatest obstacle to this reform.
He claims new data driven decision making will be the 2nd pillar, in order to determine what programs and innovations are making the biggest impact and to replicate them. Not much detail here in this speech, though...
Third pillar: teachers. Preventing layoffs, inspiring new teachers to join the profession and stay in it, and rewarding those who are best at it. In his words:
Here's what that commitment means: It means treating teachers like the professionals they are while also holding them more accountable...New teachers will be mentored by experienced ones. Good teachers will be rewarded with more money for improved student achievement, and asked to accept more responsibilities for lifting up their schools. Teachers throughout a school will benefit from guidance and support to help them improve...If a teacher is given a chance or two or three chances but still does not improve, there's no excuse for that person to continue teaching. I reject a system that rewards failure and protects a person from its consequences.
The 4th pillar is supporting innovation. Removing limits on the number of charter schools allowed in a district or state, for example. Higher standards for charters that will make it easier to close those that are failing to achieve minimum standards. These last two sentences are inspired by Arne Duncan's reforms in Chicago, by the way.
The call for expanded school year schedules, either through longer days or extension of school into the summer months, was met with great applause by the audience. He cited that South Korean students spend one full month more in school each year than do most American students. Over 12 years, well, you do the math...
And to students, after repeating the winning line about quitting is also failing the country (the best line of that speech I thought) from the Congressional address, this quote:
To any student who's watching, I say this: Don't even think about dropping out of school. Don't even think about it...High school dropouts earn about half as much as college graduates.
He offers extra help to those who have dropped out to come back and reengage. I love this idea. That is an idea we have not heard before. I hope it works.
The 5th pillar is college availability and affordability. Loans, grants, etc... This is getting kind of long, so I'm editing out details here, please forgive if this is what you're most interested in!
He concludes with this story:
I say this not only as a father, but also as a son. When I was a child my mother and I lived overseas, and she didn't have the money to send me to the fancy international school where all the American kids went to school. So what she did was she supplemented my schooling with lessons from a correspondence course. And I can still picture her waking me up at 4:30 a.m., five days a week, to go over some lessons before I went to school. And whenever I'd complain and grumble and find some excuse and say, "Awww, I'm sleepy," she'd patiently repeat to me her most powerful defense. She'd say, "This is no picnic for me either, buster." (Laughter and applause.)
And when you're a kid you don't think about the sacrifices they're making. She had to work; I just had to go to school. But she'd still wake up every day to make sure I was getting what I needed for my education. And it's because she did this day after day, week after week, because of all the other opportunities and breaks that I got along the way, all the sacrifices that my grandmother and my grandfather made along the way, that I can stand here today as President of the United States. It's because of the sacrifices -- (applause.)
There is that word: sacrifices. None of this will come to pass if we are not strong enough to sacrifice for it. For the long term development of our national human potential.
I do not agree with every one of these proposals. My intent here was not to share my agreement or disagreement, but to start the conversation by sharing the contents, the blueprint for education reform, that was announced today in this speech.
Now, class: discuss!
The future belongs to the nation that best educates its citizens.