Delaware Liberal

Common Corporate, Race To the Top, No Textbook Publisher Left Behind, these will be legacies of a lost decade-plus in education reform.  Bloated bureaucracies full of bean-counters will hopefully shrink and vanish. Make no mistake, while HB 50 is just one bill in one small state, it reflects a burgeoning movement nationally to reject the K-12 reform that was foisted on us by people with next to no experience in, you know, educating children. Thinkers like Nicholas Kristof are already focusing on where our efforts would be best allocated in the post-reform era.  Yes, the notion of reform was well-intended, still is, for that matter, in a time when there continue to be inequities in education.  However, charter schools and one-size-fits-all testing have proven to help perpetuate and accelerate those inequities, as opposed to alleviating them.  Which is what happens when there are huge piles of money thrown at the issue, and greedy corporations and individuals looking to pocket the proceeds. In fact, one could argue (and I will) that the most vocal proponents for this reform were those who (or in the case of Dubya, his family) stood to gain the most financially from the reforms. HB 50(Kowalko) is important less for what it would do, than for what it represents.  The bill serves as a reflection of the mounting dissatisfaction with both the disastrous education reform policies of the past decade and also the Bigfoot approach that this governor and his corporate comrade cum  Secretary of Education have tried to impose/inflict on those with the nerve to fight back.  "We may be wrong (although we're not), but we have the power to crush you like a bug" does very little to win friends and influence people.  With knowledgeable education-oriented legislators joining the likes of John Kowalko in the General Assembly recently (Kim Williams, Bryan Townsend, and Sean Matthews, among others), legislators are starting to understand how bad the current policies are.  Plus, teachers, parents, and students have found their voices on these issues. Which is why getting HB 50 out of committee is/was important.  There is also a bipartisan coalition forming on this issue, with many conservative legislators joining their progressive counterparts in support of HB 50.  The question is whether the Chamber of Commerce types still have the numbers to outvote them. Might I point out that the Chamber of Commerce has embraced this disastrous reform going back to Phase One during the unlamented Carper years? If you support this bill, it is absolutely essential that you contact your legislators, especially, for now, your state representative.  Kevin Ohlandt has done all the work for us, so click on this to get your specific marching orders. BTW, thanks, Kevin, for your contribution to the cause! Exceptional Delaware is an exceptional blog.