Obama rejects view crisis must temper ambition
President Barack Obama on Tuesday refused to temper his ambitious reform drive despite the economic storm, marking his 50th day in office by promising a 'cradle to career' overhaul of US education.
Obama invoked the names of great presidents Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt and John Kennedy, to argue that the crisis-wracked United States could not afford to ignore the imperative for daring political reform.
"I know there are some who believe we can only handle one challenge at a time," Obama said, in a nod to critics who have faulted him for not training his sole attention on the deepening economic crisis.
"They forget that Lincoln helped lay down the transcontinental railroad, passed the Homestead Act, and created the National Academy of Sciences in the midst of civil war.
"Likewise, President Roosevelt didn't have the luxury of choosing between ending a depression and fighting a war," Obama told the US-Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.
"President Kennedy didn't have the luxury of choosing between civil rights and sending us to the moon."
Obama warned US education was leaving young Americans unprepared for the 21st century global economy.
He backed more investment, better teachers and longer school hours, promising to boost early education and higher learning in a "cradle to career" grounding for US kids.
But a plan to push merit pay for teachers could bring him into conflict with US education unions -- a powerful constituency of his Democratic Party.
"Let there be no doubt: the future belongs to the nation that best educates its citizens," Obama said.
"Yet, despite resources that are unmatched anywhere in the world, we have let our grades slip, our schools crumble, our teacher quality fall short, and other nations outpace us."
The president declared that the time for "finger-pointing" was over and should be replaced by new investments, higher expectations for students, and rewards for good teachers and dismissal for bad ones.
Obama movingly evoked the example of his late mother who helped supplement his education during his childhood years in Indonesia to convince parents to help their kids raise their grades.
"I can still picture her, waking me up at 4:30 in the morning five days a week to go over some lessons before I went to school.
"And whenever I'd complain or grumble and find some excuse and say 'Aww, I'm sleepy' she'd patiently repeat to me her most powerful defense -- 'This is no picnic for me either, buster.'"
The Obama education plan would raise required standards for reading and mathematics and promote new ways of tracking student progress.
It would expand performance pay models, try to improve the skills of sub-standard teachers and remove those that could not be improved.
The plan would pour money into failing schools to cut drop out rates, and expand financial aid to poor higher education students and target community colleges and courses for emerging educational disciplines.
Obama also hit out at comparatively long vacations and short school hours enjoyed by US children and teachers, saying they deprived American youngsters of months of high-quality education.
"The challenges of a new century demand more time in the classroom -- if they can do that in South Korea, we can do it right here in the United States of America."
Obama intends to reform rather than scrap the keystone school reform introduced by his predecessor George W. Bush's administration, the No Child Left Behind program.
Figures from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) show US school children trailing their counterparts in other industrialized nations in reading, mathematics and science.
The President of the American Federation of Teachers union, Randi Weingarten, praised Obama's goals but added: "as with any public policy, the devil is in the details, and it is important that teachers' voices are heard as we implement the president's vision."
She did not mention merit pay, which has been a controversial as some teachers fear it could be linked to test scores, and thereby penalize colleagues with less gifted students.
The National Education Association, which represents 3.2 million elementary and secondary teachers said Obama was off to a "solid start" in reforming education.
AFP
