Race to the Top

Now that I am getting into more of my core classes in the College of Education, I am hearing a whole new kind of "chatter" than what I am used to thus far in my college career. The "basic" classes that I took my first two years of college (i.e. English 101, World Lit 2, Biology, etc.) were made up of a blended assortment of students with different majors. We all talked about general things that we could all discuss and have some interest in. For instance, we never discussed what was happening at NASA from the engineering aspect or what new music the marching band was learning. We discussed more common things such as what we did on the weekends or what was going on in the class that we shared together because most of us college students interact in similar activities, usually with just slight variations. The "chatter" is slightly different now though. Now, all of my classes consist of college students with the same major who have the same desire, passion, and love for children and education as I do.

This week as my classmates and I were waiting for class to begin, the girl to my right asked a small group of us if we had seen President Obama's recent speech on education. As the girls began to "Ooh", "Aah", and spill their opinions about his speech, I sat silently. I had missed his speech due to working late, but with all of the intriguing discussion between the girls, I knew it was something that I wanted to look further into, and so I did. I went onto Google's website and started my search. I came across the actual footage concerning the No Child Left Behind Act portion of his speech on CNN's website. I was surprised to see how unclear he seemed to be with his response to the teacher's question as to what was going to happen with it. He mentioned many things that need to be done, but he never really discussed what the plan was going to be to enhance the Act other than his 'Race to the Top' competition that was previously set forth. I have had mixed feelings about the 'Race to the Top' proposal since my hearing of it. I had not looked over it some time, so I decided to check www.edweek.org (my main source of information concerning education) to see what they had about 'Race to the Top'. Fortunately, I found an article that specifically included President Obama's speech that I had just watched and information about 'Race to the Top'. I was somewhat disturbed at what I read. The article explained that states were "scrambled to rewrite laws in order to be considered eligible for a share of $4 billion in federal Race to the Top grants" (Education Week, 2010, February 2). The article also stated how states were acting to rewrite laws without even knowing for sure that they were going to even get a portion of the money. "Though participation in the Race to the Top competition is voluntary, recession-battered states are, in effect, being “coerced” by the lure of money to adopt policies that have not necessarily been shown to raise student achievement" says lawmakers (Education Week, 2010, February 2). I hate to think that our elected political officers are making radical decisions based on mere hope. In my opinion, I think that the federal government should leave the majority of decision making up to the individual states and school systems. I do not think that the individual schools or systems should have ultimate decision making but that the bulk of it is left for their deciding. I was shocked to learn from the article as well that "according to 2006-2007 data from the National Center for Education Statistics, the federal contribution was slightly higher at 8.5 percent" (Education Week, 2010, February 2). I believe that if that is the amount that the federal government is contributing then that is about how much say-so that they should receive in the decision making for schools.

As much as I am in support of bettering the knowledge and quality of our teachers, and improving student achievement; I am not sure that this is the best way to go about doing so. Due to the economy being so unstable and at very low spot, education officials seem to be willing to do whatever it takes to get the money needed for their schools; even if it means rewriting laws without guaranteed benefits.


Education Week: State Lawmakers Unhappy With Obama Priorities. (2010, February 2). Education Week American Education News Site of Record. Retrieved February 3, 2010, from http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/02/01/21ncsl.h29.html?tkn=RZYFwzJqh0vEEf9ItBcBO7jC7B9FdnloYtsH.

Video - Breaking News Videos from CNN.com. (2010, February 2). CNN.com - Breaking News, U.S., World, Weather, Entertainment & Video News. Retrieved February 3, 2010, from http://www.cnn.com/video/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_freevideo+%28RSS%3A+Video%29#/video/politics/2010/02/02/obama.nh.townhall.education.cnn