The Politics of National Standards

By Tom Loveless

As the American school's latest reform movement gathered momentum in the 1980's, the idea of national standards raised a noble hope, the belief that if we spotlighted the grandest peaks of knowledge in school subjects, teachers and students would strive to scale them. We are now close to seeing Congress pass legislation establishing national standards (the "goals 2000: educate America act''), but as befalls many great ideas, the codified reality is distinguished more by pragmatic compromises than by soaring aspirations. Though essential to the art of governing, in this case political compromise has dealt a potentially mortal...