Margaret Spellings: The last NCLB defender?
These days it’s hard to find a strong supporter of No Child Left Behind.
Rep. John Kline, the Republican in line to take over the education committee in the House, thinks the law that ushered in a destructive era of high-stakes testing and phony accountability is a mess. He wants to rewrite it.
Education Secretary Arne Duncan, who has been a big supporter, has nevertheless labeled as "utopian" the 2014 deadline for all students to be proficient on science, math and reading tests.
Diane Ravitch, an education historian who initially supported NCLB, wrote a scathing critique of it in her bestselling book The Death and Life of the Great American School System.
Enter Margaret Spellings, former secretary of education and a key architect of No Child Left Behind. She now runs Margaret Spellings and Company, a public policy and strategic consulting firm.
In an interview with my colleague Jay Mathews, Spellings said that NCLB is “a good strong law” with “good strong deadlines.” It should stay on the