Using Research to Improve Clinton's Education Bill

Beginning of article

THE CLINTON Administrations education bill that is working its way through Congress looks a lot like last year's version, which died in the final days of the session. The new bill is a warm-up for bigger things to come (especially the reauthorization of Chapter 1). It would make the national education goals a formal national policy, continue work on higher curriculum standards, and support the development of a new assessment system. The school delivery standards of 1992, which were meant to ensure that reforms are fair, have now become "opportunity-to-learn" standards in the new version of the bill.

In just a few months, however, the context surrounding these proposals has changed. The more education reform is debated and analyzed, the more we learn about what makes good -- and mistaken -- policy. The current legislation could make some big mistakes. Embedded in it are two approaches that fall short of the sophisticated policy making we need in American education today: one is the blame game; the other is the top-down quick fix.

Undoubtedly, the frustrations of …