(Guest Post by Matthew Ladner)
Ed Week reports that a growing number of states have signaled their intention to ignore the 2014 deadline. USDoE threatens action against these states, and is hoping to leverage the 2014 deadline to spur Congress to act on reauthorization. Congress seems disinterested. Tennessee and others have announced that they will seek waivers, which Secretary Duncan is willing to grant in return for reform, but which Chairman Kline seems to oppose. Duncan wants a reauthorization, but it isn’t in the cards.
Where is all this heading?
Actually, a full-blown train-wreck is not inevitable there is still time to reauthorize ESEA, even if they wait until after the election. Seeing states engage in what could either be described as civil disobedience or lawlessness does send a clear signal that Congress and the administration need to deal with the 2014 event horizon, and that the Safe Harbor loophole is insufficient.
Closer…..move a little closer….a little more….GOTCHA!
Reauthorization beats waivers, and waivers beat the status-quo, which runs the risk of a great cut score dummy down. Washington would be awfully dull without some brinkmanship every now and then, so let’s see how they work this out. Something that would allow states with a system to nudge improvement out of their schools (which NCLB is doing very little of) to run their own testing systems still seems like a sensible idea to me.
Jay P. Greene's Blog 
Would very much appreciate you insight and opinion on the July 7 audio file (Kline interviewed by Bennett) from the House Education and the Workforce Committee. Do you think the committee is heading in the right direction?
http://edworkforce.house.gov/Audio/
I haven’t had a chance to read the legislation, but broadly speaking I think that state flexibility is desirable.