Pull of federal dollars . . .

Over at Education Next, Chester Finn writes about a pot of money separate from RttT that he believes may have even greater influence on education over time. It is a much smaller pot of money than the $400 billion RttT pot that will be awarded to a consortia of states to develop common core assessments aligned with the common core standards currently being developed. This is just one more example of federal dollars being used to establish a direction for education in our country.

In Finn’s words:

The simple fact that dollars from Washington are to be used to develop what will inevitably be termed the “national test” entangles Uncle Sam big time in what has, to date, been a non-federal process of devising “common core standards” for states to adopt on a voluntary basis. (The National Governors Association [NGA] and Council of Chief State School Officers [CCSSO] have spearheaded that process, using private funds.) Such entanglement carries unavoidable problems . . .

This problem is compounded (there has already been noise at congressional hearings and grumps from influential Republicans) by Duncan’s decision to use states’ participation in the “common standards” and “common assessment” processes as criteria for determining which states qualify for RTT dollars. The (obvious) concern is that, while such participation is technically voluntary, Uncle Sam is deploying potent incentives to prod states into joining.

Another example of the power of federal dollars to influence state education programs is the decision in California to allow state officials to close schools, convert them to charters, or replace the principal and half the staff. Parents of children in the lowest performing schools will also be given more opportunity to send their children to other schools. Though the legislation passed and is now before the governor for signature, it was not without dissent.

"This program essentially is extortion, plain and simple," said Sen. Rod Wright, D-Inglewood. "We're about to make permanent changes to our educational system and we don't even have assurances that we'll get ... the money."

Would these changes have been in place if there wasn’t the opportunity for $700 million in federal grants? I think not.