Activists decry Bush
education bill

Major public-policy and traditional-values organizations that helped elect President George W. Bush have made an about-face, calling the president's education plan a "big-government, big-spending liberal piece of legislation."

Those are the words Free Congress Foundation President Paul Weyrich used to describe H.R. 1 and S. 1, the respective House of Representatives and Senate versions of Bush's education plan. Other groups opposed to the "No Child Left Behind Act" include Focus on the Family, Eagle Forum and the Traditional Values Coalition.

Yesterday, as the House plowed through dozens of proposed amendments to H.R. 1 to ready the bill for final passage today, Weyrich slammed the measure as an appeasement to California Democrat education guru Rep. George Miller, whom Weyrich describes as "to the left of Ted Kennedy on education, believe it or not."

"The Bush administration wants a bi-partisan education bill so badly that it basically went to Miller and asked him what it would take to get his support. He emasculated the original Bush bill. To the horror of the conservative Republicans on the committee, Miller and his liberal Democratic colleagues took hold of Bush's bill and restructured it into an old-fashioned, big government big spending, liberal piece of legislation. And they did so with the blessing of the White House," wrote Weyrich.

"When dismayed conservatives took their case to the Bush political operatives, they were told point blank that 'the president wants to sign a bi-partisan education bill.' So they are doing what it takes to get a bi-partisan education bill, which is basically to sell out to the liberals," he continued.

In his radio address Thursday to an audience of 7.5 million listeners, Focus on the Family President Dr. James Dobson said the bill "represents the greatest expansion of the federal government's role in public education that we've seen to date." Under the bill, the federal Department of Education budget will increase by 22 percent -- double the original spending hike Bush had previously proposed.

Dobson said the increase is unwise since the department "can't even account for $450 million in federal money that they have received in the last three years. Nearly half a billion dollars have just been wasted, and now we are going to give those same people $9.2 billion more in order to continue the same policies? It is a disaster."

"George W. Bush wants to be known as the 'education president' but in order to get that done, he has essentially agreed to an education bill that could have easily been inspired by Al Gore and written by liberal Democrats," he continued. "There is nothing in this education bill that will please pro-family people."

The bill no longer includes provisions for private-school vouchers or unconditional flexibility to local school districts, Dobson noted. Rather, financial flexibility is given to school districts in states that comply with certain federal mandates, including norm-referenced testing, which is required of all states seeking federal funds.

Such tests are technically developed by individual states but are all basically the same since less than a half-dozen companies are hired to write them, noted Dr. Karen R. Effrem, an activist with the Maple River Education Coalition in Minnesota -- just one of 50 national and state organizations opposed to the president's education plan. Critics of the tests say they are designed not to measure academic skills but social attitudes and behaviors, consistent with the purpose of Goals 2000.

For example, Michigan's state assessment test asks students, "Should PACs [Political Action Committees] be prohibited from operating in the American political system? You may either support or oppose PACs. Write a letter to your United States senator. Use information to provide reasons that support your position."

Another question on the Michigan test asks, "Should women members of the military services be allowed to participate in combat?"

Goals 2000, as well as the School To Work program, is a Clinton-era education plan that places emphasis on the learning of job skills and social values, rather than academics. For example, in South Dakota, a student may receive credit and a certificate of "skills mastery" for working as a grocery bagger.

Even though H.R. 1 repeals Goals 2000, the effects of the program will remain, according to Effrem.

"States have spent literally billions of dollars to implement Goals 2000 and School To Work," she said. "It's not like this is just going to go away."

Effrem likens Goals 2000 to scaffolding used to create a building. Once the building is completed, the scaffolding is removed -- but the structure remains. Goals 2000 was used to create an educational system that values basic work skills and certain social values over academic knowledge and achievement, she said. Repealing the program does not undo years of work and money spent by school districts creating that system, which likely will not change.

"I don't think this bill is anywhere close to what he campaigned on," she added, pointing to the regulatory strings attached to local financial flexibility outlined in the bill. "If he really wants increased flexibility, and if he really wants local control, you can't increase the number of pages four-fold with that many more regulations and 'shalls' and 'wills' in a bill. And you also cannot increase spending that much from the federal level and expect there to be local control, because states and localities will do whatever it takes to get the federal money. They're bribing them with all the federal money to destroy liberal arts academic education."

Effrem also objects to what she says is the bill's violation of the 10th Amendment, which states in its entirety: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Since the Constitution does not grant the federal government authority in the area of education, the issue should be left solely to the states, said Effrem. The activist points to Section 1111 of H.R. 1, which reads, "Every state desiring a grant under this act shall submit to the Secretary of Education a plan …"

"That's making the Secretary of Education the de facto federal superintendent of schools," she remarked.

Also opposed to federalized education is the Traditional Values Coalition, whose chairman, Rev. Lou Sheldon, compared the president's proposal to Mad Cow disease. "H.R. 1 and S. 1 are both infected with the Mad Cow disease of liberalism. These proposals are unhealthy for parents, children and public education. These bills should be destroyed as we would a diseased bovine," he said.

The bills are expected to be considered in a conference committee this week, and Bush is preparing for a June 7 signing ceremony in the Rose Garden.

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Education plan continues federal control?