Less Deliberation; More Leadership
Looking for signs of leadership in the newly formed Senate HELP Committee, I watched the entire education hearing held last Tuesday. The deliberative chamber is certainly taking it’s time considering reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA)—the sweeping education omnibus that in its last iteration became the driving force in American education. Taking an extra year could actually be a good thing if a coherent bill was in formation, but it’s difficult to detect where bipartisan leadership will emerge on this committee to complement Miller’s leading man role in the House.
Joel Klein, NYC Chancellor, and Marco Petruzzi, Green Dot CEO, headlined the panel. The Committee was at least deferential to the successful close/replace strategy that the two have executed on opposite coasts. Klein, having replaced 90 failing schools with 400 new schools, argued that districts should use outside partners given their ability to attract talent and deliver coherent solutions.
Sen. Harkin noted that the entire panel supported schools of a manageable size but desperately wanted the answer to be class size. The panel unanimously suggested teacher quality was a much more important variable. Harkin suggested that there should be a child psychologist to every classroom—this could be a long deliberation.
