Presidents Education Reform Efforts vs. Teacher Unions?

On Wednesday of last week Representative David Obey of Wisconsin, the third-ranking member of the House, diverted money earmarked for charter schools, teacher merit pay and the Race To The Top reform initiative to help fund a jobs bill that would offset teacher layoffs. (Note: Obey has been accused of ‘carrying water for the teachers unions’- Newsweek July 2, 2010). In an interesting political play, the anti-layoff money has been attached to a bill funding the war in Afghanistan.

According to Newsweeks’ Jonathon Alter:

“In January 2009 Obey already reduced Obama’s early reform proposal from $15 billion to $5 billion. That was out of $100 billion in the stimulus bill for education, most of which went to prevent state and local teacher layoffs last year. To simplify the math, Obey wants to cut from the terrific 5 percent of education spending devoted to exciting reform proposals, not the 95 percent that went for other things.”

The bill passed through the House on Thursday and is now facing certain Republican opposition in the Senate. If Obey and the teachers unions want Senate approval there will have to be a significant tradeoff of some kind. The education reform initiatives are spoken of by President Obama as being some of his proudest achievements. Should the measure get to his desk, he has of course threatened to veto it.

If you want to take action and speak out against this proposal – if you go to the link below it will guide you in sending an email to those legislators involved: https://secure.publiccharters.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=523&JServSessionIdr004=37r7by5094.app305b