Obama’s school czar

President-elect Barack Obama is a Democrat. In modern times, the teacher unions have formed an important core constituency for the party -- so much so that unionized teachers and other unionized government employees can often form the largest bloc at any Democratic gathering.

No one expects the president-elect to make education-related appointments that purposely antagonize that important constituency.

"I don't think Obama is going to pick someone who's going to be really divisive," says Joel Packer, a lobbyist for the 3.2 million-member National Education Association, which initially chose no favorite between Sen. Obama and primary rival Sen. Hillary Clinton, but later endorsed Sen. Obama and spent millions supporting him in the general election.

On the other hand, Sen. Obama campaigned on a platform of "change." Barack Obama is widely heralded as the nation's first black president. And it's minority families -- with fewer viable escape routes -- who can suffer the most under America's often unsafe, unruly, miserably underperforming urban school regime.

It wouldn't be much of a "change" -- nor much help to inner-city families hoping to see their children prosper -- to simply whistle a happy tune while throwing more money at our deeply troubled public schools and the entrenched bureaucracies that currently run them.

That leaves debate "simmering among Democrats" as to who the new president should name as his secretary of education, The Washington Post reported Monday.

The teacher unions "want an advocate for their members, someone like Obama adviser Linda Darling-Hammond, a Stanford University professor, or Inez Tenenbaum," the former state schools chief of South Carolina, the newspaper reports. But reform advocates "want someone like New York schools chancellor Joel Klein, who wants teachers and schools held accountable for the performance of students."

In what's becoming a recognizable style, Sen. Obama has thus far played it down the middle, saying, for instance, that teacher pay should be tied to student achievement -- a sentiment bound to encourage reformers -- but then adding that this should not be based on test scores alone, an apparent sop to teachers.

For now, speculation seems to be centering on Chicago schools chief Arne Duncan, a fellow Harvard alumnus who's friendly with the president-elect, having played pick-up basketball as well as toured schools with the former Illinois senator. The Post notes Mr. Duncan visited Washington last week.

The reform group appreciates some of what Mr. Duncan has done in Chicago, where he has focused on improving struggling schools, closing those that fail and recruiting better teachers. But, unlike Joel Klein or Washington schools chief Michelle Rhee, Mr. Duncan has also managed to avoid alienating the teacher unions.

"Arne Duncan actually reaches out and tries to do things in a collaborative way," Randi Weingarten, head of the 1.4 million-member American Federation of Teachers, told The Post.

Real education "change" must at the least include easier access to vouchers or tax credits, allowing other minority families the same choice the Obamas recently announced they're going to exercise -- keeping their two daughters, 10 and 7, out of the dysfunctional Washington, D.C., public schools, instead sending them to the Quaker private school attended by Chelsea Clinton.

Beyond that, another obvious solution is more competition at every level.

Will the Obama presidency be a facilitator -- or an obstacle -- to that kind of real "change" in the public schools? Much will be telegraphed by his forthcoming choice of secretary of education.