Candidate Series

Newt Gingrich: His anti-media plan

Using debate moments to propel his presidential election campaign.

Public Education

Public education in the United States is built on local control from locally elected school boards to appointed regents overseeing universities in cooperation with state departments of education.  Overlaying the local systems, however, is a federal Department of Education and efforts by presidents and the Congress to direct and influence the nation's classrooms.  It was 19th century reformers who pressed to make public education not only available but compulsory with some states limiting the requirement to elementary schools.  Congress joined in during that time providing support for state land-grant universities who, in exchange for the federal aid, provided agricultural research and military training.  The biggest recent change in American education came in 2002 when President George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act.  The controversial law required states to generate tests and standards to measure the annual progress of students and schools, give students of failing schools more options including transfers to other schools and provide more information.  President Obama, despite pressure to scrap the NCLB act altogether, has instead opted to amend the law to, he says, better measure academic growth beyond the current pass-fail system.

Related Legislation