Dillon writes in the NYT this morning that the president, in a speech to the governors today, will announce that the administration's NCLB proposal will require states to adopt "college- and career-ready standards" in order to receive Title I funds.
This is big and interesting news when combined with the administration's push, via RTT, for common or national standards. This could potentially mean that a state that refuses to give up its age-old prerogative to unilaterally determine the content of its academic standards could disqualify itself from hundreds of millions of federal funds annually.
What remains to be seen is if states like Texas or Alaska that are balking at the national standards push would be able to argue that their non-common standards are "college- and career-ready."
I do wonder, however, if a governor might stand up after the president's speech and ask:
"Mr. President, your secretary of education continues to say that the federal government doesn't have the answer and that Washington should get out of the way and allow states to make the most important decisions in K-12 schooling. How exactly does that square with your message today that states will lose access to Title I funds unless we relinquish our right to make the final call on arguably the most important K-12 matter: what our students learn?"
--Andy Smarick