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Building 'Institutional Infrastructure'

And Bringing Research Into the Classroom

By Suzanne Donovan

President Barack Obama is striking two chords that, if played together in his education strategy, would produce a tune different not only from his predecessor’s, but also from that of many in his own party. The first chord, influenced by Mr. Obama’s past as a community organizer, is one that resonated throughout his campaign: Real change must be built from the bottom up, or, as he put it , “block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand.” The second, heard in his plans for billions of dollars in economic stimulus, is that we must build the nation’s infrastructure so that dollars spent today will represent an investment in the future.

These two themes, sounded together, could produce some much-needed harmony of purpose in education—or at least reduce the discord that has accompanied the federal focus on accountability in the No Child Left Behind Act.

The question of whether accountability itself is good or bad does not deserve serious debate. As the current economic crisis reminds us, we must all be accountable. This is true especially for those who hold children’s futures in their hands. The real question is whether the No Child Left Behind law’s top-down mandate of accountability can, by itself, get us where we need to go. There is plenty of...