Lesson should be learned from consensus Race to the Top bill
- THE BELLINGHAM HERALD
A wise man who bore many scars from his battles over school reform gently disagreed.
I had suggested to him in March that the state was better off with no Race to the Top bill than with the tepid version presented to the state House and Senate.
The bill, the result of a deal between Gov. Chris Gregoire and the Washington Education Association, was likely not enough to serve its stated purpose: to show the federal government that the state was serious about changing its public schools.
He agreed it was too weak to win a chunk of the competitive Race to the Top sweepstakes created by the Obama Administration.
But it had to pass, he said. If it failed, leaders like Gregoire, WEA President Mary Lindquist and legislative Democrats could assert that the bill would have been enough.
Therefore, only by passing the bill and being slapped down by U.S. Education Secretary
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