Call them the ‘Know-nothings’

California could lose out on millions of federal education dollars unless legislators change a law that prevents the state from using student test scores to measure teachers' performance, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan was expected to announce in a speech Friday.

"California has among the worst records of any state in collecting and using data to evaluate teachers and schools," The Los Angeles Times reported late last week.

"Moreover, a 2006 law that created a teacher database explicitly prohibited the use of student test scores to hold teachers accountable on a statewide basis, although it did not mention local districts."

Are Nevadans finding any of his familiar? Nevada Revised Statute 386.650 is supposedly "designed to improve the ability of the Department, school districts and the public schools in this State" to track how well students are doing via test scores. But the teacher unions and their allies in Carson City managed to insert into that law a section which specifies "The information maintained pursuant to paragraphs (c), (d) and (e) must be used for the purpose of improving the achievement of pupils and improving classroom instruction but must not be used" (our italics) "for the purpose of evaluating an individual teacher or paraprofessional."

Data-driven school reform -- the kind the powerful teacher unions have blocked in both California and Nevada -- is a major focus of the Obama administration's education policies.

In recent public appearances, Secretary Duncan has singled out California's law as "ridiculous" and "mind-boggling," saying it prevents the state from identifying which of the state's 300,000 teachers are effective and which are not.

"No one in California can tell you which teacher is in which category," Mr. Duncan said at one meeting of education officials. "Something is wrong with that picture."

Could Nevada face the same cutoff of federal funds, for similarly blocking school administrators from using data already in existence to identify and reward teachers whose students consistently move ahead, while taking aside those whose kids stagnate or fall behind -- yes, after making allowances for teachers saddled with excess "problem kids" -- and advising them of all the wonderful career opportunities now available elsewhere?

Initial indications are that the cutoff threat could indeed also apply to Nevada.

It would still be better if the federal government butted out of schooling entirely, leaving such matters up to the states and local communities, as specified in the Constitution. But if lawmakers in Carson City now face either a sudden budget gulf or else an emergency session to undo this union-dictated idiocy, we say it couldn't happen to a more deserving bunch.