Posts Tagged ‘No Child Left Behind’

Waiver Nation

September 29th, 2011 by John Feehery

It used to be that waivers were a bad thing.

It was bad to be put on waivers if you were in the NFL or played Major League Baseball. That meant you were out of a job.

Now, waivers are a good thing.

The Obama Administration announced that it was going to give waivers to the states of No Child Left Behind.

Too many states can’t meet the requirements of NCLB, so they are begging the Feds to give them a break.

If there is one thing that Mr. Obama and all the Republicans running for President agree on, it is that they don’t really love that landmark law legislated by John Boehner and Ted Kennedy and signed into law by W.

It’s too hard. Let’s give the states a waiver.

That, of course, begs the question: If the law is so bad, why don’t you just repeal it. Good question.

Mitt Romney promised that the first thing he would do if elected President would be to give waivers to all 50 states to the health care law signed by Mr. Obama.

Teach Your Children Well

August 22nd, 2011 by John Feehery

Are you ready for some college football?

After a summer of revelations about how corrupt the college football system has become, you could be excused for not being quite ready for a new season.

Apparently, a University of Miami booster spent millions of dollars providing prostitutes, payola, and other perks to star athletes at the program in order to restore the Hurricanes to former greatness. Isn’t that special?

This followed a scandal at Ohio State University that forced its esteemed football coach, Jim Tressell, from his job. Tressell didn’t think it was particularly useful to follow the rules as set forth by the NCAA, and while that helped him short-term to a NCAA championship, it hurt his long-term job prospects.

Last year’s Heisman Trophy winner, Cam Newton, was so tainted with scandal that it became a open question as to whether he would be forced to quit before he was to receive the award. He wasn’t and he got it anyway. The chief allegation was that Newton’s father had put his son on the open market. You pay the father a lot of money and you get the son to play for the program, a clear violation of NCAA rules.

Education

August 12th, 2010 by John Feehery

Three teachers helped spark something in me that made my education worth something.

I wasn’t a very studious student in grade school or high school.  I didn’t have much in the way of study habits.  But I got lucky because I had three teachers – one in grade school, one in middle school and one in high school – who helped me become very interested in the one subject that would help me get a decent paying job once I left college.

Mr. Sweeney was the first one to make history interesting to me.  It was in his class that I found out that I could compete with the smartest students in the class.  Mr. Freidli was my eighth grade social studies teacher.  It was in his class that I found out that I could actually do better than my classmates in the field.  Mr. Keller was my teacher junior year, and Killer Keller taught me that I didn’t really know much about history at all, which at the time, was useful knowledge, because it inspired me to learn more.  I eventually got a Master’s Degree in history, which has served me well in my career.