The Center May Not Hold for NCLB
The intensity threatens to break an already tenuous consensus. Since 2001, conservatives have opposed the law's federal intrusion, and liberals have been wary of its reliance on testing.
The law's unusual coalition of supporters, led by Bush on the right and Sen. Edward Kennedy on the left, was able to forge a compromise despite the disagreements. They persuaded conservatives to let go of party favorites like private-school vouchers, while liberals had to concede to the testing and funding levels, which some saw as inadequate. But as yesterday's bills suggest, compromise will be much harder this time around.
"It brings us back to the timeless question," says Andrew Rotherham, codirector of Education Sector, a think tank. "Will the center hold?"
Yesterday's concessions have become today's stubborn demands for reform. Some Republicans, like Rep. Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, want to hand control of education back to the states and add in private-school vouchers, opportunities to send kids in low-performing public schools to private school on the federal government's dime. Should Congress continue with NCLB, Hoekstra said yesterday in introducing new legislation, "we will soon have federal government schools."
Democrats, meanwhile, have focused their complaints once again on funding and testing. Sen. Christopher Dodd, with the strong support of the National Education Association, is now working on a bill that would inject significant flexibility into the law, probably at the cost of the strict accountability definitions the Bush administration and the Senate's Democratic leadership support. Nine Democratic senators joined Feingold in his letter last month, outlining concerns about insufficient funding and excessive mandates.
"We have concluded," they wrote, "that the testing mandates of No Child Left Behind in their current form are unsustainable and must be overhauled significantly during the reauthorization process beginning this year."
As opposition mounted yesterday, though, the Bush administration and leading House Republicans insisted reauthorization remained a possibility. Asked whether Bush was worried about eroding support for the law, White House press secretary Tony Snow replied simply, "No." Dave Schnittger, deputy chief of staff for House Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner, affirmed that. "Republicans are united," he said.
But Boehner has also declined to criticize Hoekstra's bill, and Schnittger pointed out that the leader had supported similar legislation in 2001. Ultimately, the vouchers pitch did not make it into the law.
But, said Schnittger, "with the law coming up for reauthorization, we're getting another bite at the apple. We're going to have the fight, we're going to make our arguments–and we'll see what emerges from the process."
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