Thursday, February 12, 2004

And the Mutiny Grows

Sam Dillon tells of Utah's response to the consistent underfunding by the Bush Administration of No Child Left Behind in Utah House Rebukes Bush With Its Vote on School Law. Dillon writes that Utah's Republican dominated House voted Tuesday "to prohibit the state's education authorities from using any local money to comply with the president's signature education law, No Child Left Behind." The measure came after administration officials met with Utah House members last week and possibly prevented a stronger bill rejecting No Child Left Behind altogether! Dillon notes that Utah's state superintendent of public instruction, Steven O. Laing, "said in an interview after Tuesday's vote that he considered it likely that the bill would become law."

The Utah action comes after another Republican controlled chamber, the Virginia House of Delegates, passed a resolution in January "calling on Congress to exempt Virginia and other states from the law's provisions," due to the "most sweeping intrusions into state and local control of education in the history of the United States." According to Dillon, Vermont passed a law last year similar to the one the Utah House passed. He concludes, "Although the Utah bill is similar to Vermont's law, the embarrassment to the Bush administration would be larger if it became law because Utah is so thoroughly dominated by Republicans."

Amanda Paulson has a similar column in the Christian Science Monitor, An education rebellion stirring. She lists the following:

• Several districts in Vermont and Connecticut have refused federal funds rather than comply with all No Child Left Behind (NCLB) mandates. A district in Pennsylvania is suing the state over what it sees as inequities in the law.
• At least seven states have passed resolutions criticizing the law or asking for federal waivers on some requirements.
• Maine is considering a bill - similar to one in Vermont - to prevent state funding of reforms.
• In Utah, a bill to opt out of NCLB entirely (and so forgo many federal funds) has passed the house education committee. (Note: This measure was superseded by the lesser bill reported above.)

Isn't this site closed?

It is, and I'm supposed to be retired from teaching by now. But someone at my school system woke up, decided one teacher trying to teach 29 disabled kids to read (and 40+ overall) wasn't too bright, and advertised for another teacher. They even popped for a couple of part-time assistants to avoid a denial of services lawsuit. ("Denial of services" is one of those catch phrases in special education that strike absolute terror in hearts of administrators and occasionally move them to positive action.) They're even saying nice things to me, such as, "I hope you don't retire this year." Actually, I'm now having a ball teaching K-3 special education kids.

Actually, it's fun to pop something up on this page every now and then just to see what happens. It also keeps the page current with the search engines in case I ever suffer a severe head injury and decide to resume regular publication of the site:-).

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