The Bush Administration is trying to manipulate local education again. Taken at face value, their plan to raise standards in local schools could be a good idea. But the Bush Administration has a poor track record of being fair and even handed.
When Republican senators quietly tucked a major new student-aid program into the 774-page budget bill last month, they not only approved a five-year, $3.75 billion initiative. They also set up what could be an important shift in U.S. education: The federal government for the first time will rate the academic rigor of the nation’s 18,000 high schools.
The measure, backed by the Bush administration and expected to pass the House next month, would provide $750 to $1,300 grants to low-income college freshmen and sophomores who have completed “a rigorous secondary-school program of study” and larger amounts to juniors and seniors majoring in math, science and other critical fields.
Margaret Spellings, the secretary of education, would define rigorous, giving her a new foothold in matters of high-school curriculum.
Mindful of the delicate politics at play, senior Department of Education officials said they would consult governors and other groups in determining which high-school programs would allow students to qualify for grants.
Rigorous, indeed. How about that intelligent design? That rigorous?
I will bet anyone dollars to donuts that the majority of the grants end up going to white high schools in predominantly Republican areas.
Any takers?