An Open Briefing for President Bush

Abstract

Bad Presidents do nothing, mediocre Presidents do only what they're forced to do, good Presidents do what's possible, and great Presidents do what's necessary, Mr. Sutton avers. But we've not had any great Presidents for some time. Mr. Sutton's suggestions for George Bush are intended to help the new President break that pattern. MR. PRESIDENT, great opportunity awaits you. Decades ago, it took a Republican to reach out to China, and maybe today only a Republican can reach out to education. It's worth trying and worth doing. Your easiest task will be to avoid the mistakes of your predecessors. President Clinton loaded his education brain trust with university people - with predictable results. I prefer K-12 experts who have practical experience in schools. I'm funny that way. Like most of President Clinton's mistakes, this wasn't entirely his fault. Having university folk determine K-12 policy has been the rage since the 1930s, when the Carnegie Corporation imposed its will on schools. University folk structured teacher licensure to correspond exactly with colleges of liberal arts. It's still that way in 50 states. Such a practice maximizes credit hours in liberal arts, and university presidents are funny about the economics of credit hours. If you want to change things, try putting educators in charge of education policy; it's about the only thing that hasn't been tried. You've made a good start with your choice for secretary of education. Yes, Roderick Paige has a background in higher education, but he did go back to K-12. Don't waste him on vouchers. You and I both know that this issue serves mostly to keep ideologues happy - until you've tamed them. He's too good to waste carrying water in a leaky bucket. Give him something real; you won't regret it. The problem has never been managing professionals, but unleashing them. Here's another Clinton mistake you can avoid: he relied on Arkansas to set national policy. It didn't occur to him that what worked in his home state wouldn't necessarily work in states with high student achievement. These states already have adequacy and are poised to achieve excellence. Exporting solutions from low-achieving states lowers performance in high-achieving states. Forget what you learned in Texas. It won't transfer to Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, or Connecticut. Avoid bullying teachers. This has been going on since the publication of A Nation at Risk in 1983. Political fund raisers needed an enemy, so they created As experts in marketing, they knew that the only way to bring down one was to convince people that something was wrong with one. No sense trying to convince people that two is as good. But just as Hertz is still number one, people still believe that public education is best. The bullies' only achievement has been the Lake Wobegon Effect: Everyone is fine in my school, thank you, but the school down the road is a basket case. You can confirm this by reading the annual Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup polls. What's more, beating up teachers hasn't lowered public esteem for teachers. People still rate teaching at the top of the list of respected careers. Besides, the line between conservatism and fascism is a fine one: a conservative who bullies or scapegoats becomes a fascist. Here's something to bear in mind: teachers are the only major political group that goes both ways - one-third Democrat, one-third Republican, one-third Independent. It's pretty dumb politically to alienate this swing vote; you may need it next time. The political dynamic is simple: teachers consistently endorse the more moderate candidate because support for education increases as candidates approach the center of the political spectrum. (You can't expect teachers to support those who don't support them.) Indeed, moderation is a professional habit for teachers. They work to get students to see both sides of an issue and to help them make up their own minds. …