TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/100989/10098900.072

Text File | 1992-09-23 | 5.8 KB | 113 lines

                                                                                EDUCATION, Page 60

Calling for an Overhaul


Bush and the Governors agree on reform goals for the schools

By Dan Goodgame


    The power to summon others and the ability to command
attention rank high among the tools of any leader. Last week
George Bush wielded both of them artfully in pursuing his
long-promised bid to become "the education President." During
two crisply photogenic autumn days at the University of Virginia
in Charlottesville, he convened his Cabinet and the nation's
Governors for a historic summit that raised hopes of new
national leadership, if not new federal funds, to address the
critical problems facing American public education.

    While the meeting produced more talk than action, its
high-powered guest list and coverage by some 700 journalists,
including anchors of ABC and CNN national networks, lent it a
tone of drama and urgency. Not since Franklin Roosevelt's day
had a President called the nation's Governors together. Topping
F.D.R.'s agenda was a search for ways to cope with the
Depression. Bush sought to deal with a crisis whose long-range
results could prove no less catastrophic for American power and
prosperity: the failure of U.S. schools to teach the basic
skills needed to keep Americans productive and competitive.

    Faced with that daunting challenge, Bush and the Governors
were able to reach an unprecedented agreement to set national
performance standards and goals for the schools and to measure
each state's progress. Only a few years ago, such a step would
have provoked loud complaints against federal encroachment on
the traditional autonomy of states and local school districts.
Now, however, the idea of national standards is supported by
solid majorities in opinion polls. "Bold action is what we
need," Bush told the Governors. "The American people are ready
for radical reforms." Despite the high-flown rhetoric, however,
the summit's achievements were not so much radical as merely
encouraging.

    Bush won some respect for attaching his prestige to the
knotty education issue, but many Governors are still waiting to
see whether the President will make the tough choices necessary
to establish education as a genuine priority. Some wonder, for
example, why he retains the so far ineffectual Lauro Cavazos as
Education Secretary. They also wonder why a self-proclaimed
education President would propose, in effect, to cut federal
education spending $400 million, adjusted for inflation.

    Most important, on a day when Congress voted to fulfill
Bush's campaign promise to reduce capital-gains taxes for the
wealthy, Governors of both parties pressed for information on
when Bush would redeem another campaign pledge: to fund fully
the Head Start program for needy preschoolers. Head Start has
proved cost-effective in preparing disadvantaged students for
school, but can now accommodate only about 1 in 5 of those
eligible. As the summit closed, White House chief of staff John
Sununu noted that "the Governors succeeded quite well in
convincing the President of the value of preschool and
early-childhood programs." Bush conceded "the need for more
federal support for the prekindergarten education process."

    The prospects for a substantial increase in federal
education funding were dim, however. For weeks, Bush and his
aides had rejected the notion that an education President should
spend more on education. A senior White House official pointed
out that federal funds account for only about 7% of total
spending on education, and argued that much of the money is
spent so inefficiently that "we could eliminate most of it and
nobody would notice." Such arguments moved New York Governor
Mario Cuomo, a liberal Democrat, to retort that waste and
inefficiency never prevented the Administration from spending
on defense.

    Although most Governors agreed that more federal spending
on schools is not the answer to their problems, they did ask
that Bush help them hack through the thicket of regulations that
accompany existing federal education grants. Bush agreed, in the
words of Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton, to "swap red tape for
results" in disbursing federal money. Those funds now come
encumbered by rules that, for example, prevent night classes of
adults from using computers bought for day classes of
handicapped students.

    The Governors, in turn, pledged to promote two of Bush's
favorite nostrums: freedom for parents to choose which public
schools their children attend, and "alternative certification"
for career switchers who move into teaching. Bush and the
Governors also agreed on the need for school "restructuring,"
which generally means letting individual schools be run by
teachers, principals and parents rather than by bureaucrats in
district headquarters or state capitals.

    One of the most provocative reform ideas came from drug
czar William Bennett, the former Education Secretary, who
bluntly described much of what he heard at the summit as "pap
-- and stuff that rhymes with pap." Bennett noted, for example,
that "everybody seems to like national performance goals, but
the question is . . . What happens if we don't reach them?" He
suggested that "if we're not able in five years to get our
schools back up to where they were in 1963, after spending 40%
more, then maybe we should just . . . give people their money
back and let them educate themselves or start their own schools.
That would be one radical way to have accountability." Irritated
White House officials scrambled to dissociate themselves from
Bennett's impolitic outburst. But if the President and the
Governors fail to show concrete results in this latest round of
school reform, perhaps parents will be ready to take Bennett up
on his offer.