EDITORIAL: McCain offers choice on education

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"Education is the civil rights issue of our time." No truer words have been spoken, from the mouths of former Education Secretary Rod Paige, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and John McCain. Understanding the scope and depth of this statement is essential for the next president, particularly when dropout rates are as high as 70 percent in some school districts, deep disparities in achievement between minority and non-minority students exist and parents struggle to compete for coveted spots in better-performing schools. Addressing this civil rights challenge won't simply take more money, but will require a commitment to raising educational standards, demanding greater accountability, offering more flexibility among principals and teachers - allowing choice to flourish.

Mr. McCain is a champion for reform and choice. His Web site states: "If a school will not change, the students should be able to change schools. John McCain believes parents should be empowered with school choice to send their children to the school that can best educate them just as many members of Congress do with their own children."

McCain campaign surrogate Alveda King, niece of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., is not only a staunch pro-life advocate but staunchly pro-parent. Miss King travels the country touting the benefits of school choice and the work she has done to ensure that her uncle's dream of equality - including equal access to education - continues. What better mouthpiece is there to carry that message? It is telling that she is with Team McCain.

Mr. McCain, who was a Vietnam POW at the time of King's assassination, has spoken recently of the civil rights leader and what his dream meant to the senator. He also admitted to the "mistake" he made when he initially voted against the King national holiday, before working to give his full support to making it a state holiday in Arizona. But Mr. McCain has also drawn from King's own words as they relate to equal access in education.

What No Child Left Behind (NCLB) started, by closing the achievement gap between white and black students, Mr. McCain wants to continue, with a bit of "tweaking." Critics have argued for more flexibility when schools are penalized for underperforming. Mr. McCain agrees.

Barack Obama has all but called for an end to the bipartisan NCLB act, which is a throw-the-baby-out-with-the-bath-water approach to fixing what's broken. Even the most liberal teachers who have harshly criticized NCLB tell us NCLB is still needed - "mend it do not end it."

Some may argue that Messrs. McCain and Obama aren't that far apart when it comes to education - after all, both say they support choice and both favor merit pay for teachers. However, Mr. Obama does not support vouchers, which have been a godsend to parents in the nation's capital and elsewhere. The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship program serves nearly 2,000 low-income families, with thousands more on a waiting list, hoping to gain access to better, safer schools. Mr. Obama has referred to this notion as "tired rhetoric." And although he says he "supports" charters, which is easy to do since it is now established law, Mr. Obama hasn't offered any indication that he would expand them.

In addition, Mr. Obama's efforts to do away with secret union ballots further threatens to expand the power of teachers' unions - which have been the greatest impediments to school choice because they would essentially block the school-yard door of choice.

Mr. Obama has offered nothing more than lip service to requiring federal standards and accountability with the millions more he proposes to spend. In contrast, Mr. McCain has committed to at least three significant education reforms: merit pay for teachers; the creation of online classrooms; and decentralizing bureaucracy. He proposes doing so by utilizing current funding as opposed to piling on millions of dollars.

In his speech to the NAACP earlier this year, Mr. McCain asked the audience to consider this: "Equal access to public education has been gained. But what is the value of access to a failing school?" We agree.

Education is among the highest key deterrents to poverty reduction. Reward what works, end what doesn't, put parents in charge of their children's' education and get government out of the way. That's the American way.