Tuesday, July 27, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

EDUCATION SECRETARY IN LAS VEGAS: Garcia differs with Paige

Superintendent disputes federal official's claims on No Child Left Behind Act

U.S. Education Secretary Rod Paige speaks Monday with the editorial board of the Review-Journal. Photo by Jeff Scheid.

U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige asserted Monday that the biggest civil rights issue now facing the nation is the achievement gap between white students and minorities, a view that drew unqualified support from local education officials.

But his belief that the No Child Left Behind Act is adequately funded and his prediction that the number of low-performing schools on notice throughout the country will decline in the future elicited quite a different reaction.

"I'd have to disagree with that," said Clark County School District Superintendent Carlos Garcia, who last week announced the number of local "needs improvement" schools had quadrupled. "If you look at what's happening across the country, the number of schools in need of improvement is growing. My prediction would be that will continue."

States' results for school standings under No Child Left Behind, which calls for all students to achieve proficiency by 2013, are still being tabulated for this year. Nevada's results will be announced in August but will likely reflect the trend in Clark County, which went from having 18 schools on the "needs improvement list" in 2002-03, to 82 schools in 2003-04.

Paige, who interviewed with the editorial board of the Review-Journal, was in Las Vegas as a guest speaker for the national convention of the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. The attacks on the funding levels of federal education reform are rooted in politics, he said. Opponents of the Republican administration are looking for ways to criticize a measure that Paige said is supported by a cross section of elected representatives.

"It's a political gimmick," Paige said. "The GAO (Government Accountability Office) says that it's not an unfunded mandate, and the GAO is a bipartisan arm of Congress."

John Jasonek, executive director of the Clark County Education Association, asked how Paige could deny the financial burden the law has become to public schools, which have had to increase expenditures on testing and supplemental education services.

"All you have to do is look across the country and see what No Child Left Behind has cost," Jasonek said.

Paige also expressed his support for providing families in low-performing schools with school choice and broadening that option to include private schools.

"I believe choice is a necessary condition to authentic school reform," Paige said.

Garcia agrees with the philosophy of choice, but he cautioned against the abandonment of struggling public schools.

"If you have a school that's not good, how is everybody leaving it going to fix it?" Garcia said. "I don't think running away from the problem is the answer."

But on the issue of the achievement gap, Garcia and Paige have a consensus. Garcia said the focus on black and Hispanic student performance has been honed by the federal act's requirement that test results for individual ethnic groups count toward a school's standing.

"We are finally addressing closing the achievement gap," Garcia said. "That's the most powerful part of No Child Left Behind."