The LEARN Act, An Alternative to No Child Left Behind

Bush’s Bureaucratic Banality: Leave It Behind

Representative Scott Garrett (R-NJ), who leads the U.S. House of Representative’s Conservative Caucus, has introduced House Bill 3177 (H.B. 3177), also called the LEARN (Local Education Authority Returns Now) Act, which is an alternative to the flawed and much maligned Bush-Kennedy No Child Left Behind (NCLB) bureaucratic-driven legislative nightmare. NCLB is coming up for reauthorization after 5 years.

Essentially anytime the government gets involved with anything it messes it up – education, transportation, healthcare, etc. The federal government is too unwieldy and inflexible to deal with issues which are better dealt with on the local level. This is exactly what our founders called for in the first place. Federal government should take care of foreign affairs and leave most of the domestic concerns to the states.

Rick Green of WallBuilders calls the LEARN Act, “A great bill that helps reclaim some of the ground that the Founding Fathers gave to us and gets us back into what we call limited government, where the federal government is limited from going into all the areas it does now.”

I recently listened to a WallBuilders Live Radio Show where Rick Green interviewed Rep. Scott Garrett, who discussed the LEARN Act. Representative Garrett stated that this bill is meant to “bring back the authority to where the Founding Fathers’ intended it when it comes to education. That is back to the PARENTS, the TEACHERS and the LOCAL COMMUNITY, as opposed to Washington, D.C.” Rep. Garrett emphasized that the Founders never intended for there to be a massive bureaucratic Department of Education dictating our children’s education. The Founders intended education to be local in nature.

With the No Child Left Behind program coming up for reauthorization this is an excellent time to re-examine and if possible do away or modify significantly this wasteful and unnecessary program.

In an online Human Events article Rep. Garrett wrote, “My bill, the LEARN Act (Local Education Authority Returns Now), would get to the real matter at hand and allow local and state governments to create and enforce public education themselves . . .

He continued, “. . . My bill . . . gives states the ability to opt out of NCLB and provides residents of those states a tax credit equal to the amount that they would have otherwise received in federal funding. This gives control back to the states, allowing them to pursue local and state educational initiatives based on what they believe will best help their students. States and local school districts then set their own standards, enforce their own penalties for failure, and establish their own goals for teachers and students. Accountability would be transferred from D.C. bureaucrats to the people who know the schools and the students personally.”

In the interview with Rick Green Rep. Garrett stated that factions within the Democrat Party are divided into two camps. One faction wants to expand the NCLB and pour additional money into it (spend, spend, spend). The other faction wants to strip all accountability requirements out of NCLB. Neither solution is a good one. The LEARN Act seems like the best choice, give the states the ability to opt out of the federal control entirely and allow each state that does so, to keep its money it would ordinary send to Washington and use it how it deems best. This alternative probably is too sensible and economical for the Democrat controlled Congress to grasp, let alone pass!

TAKE ACTION

Urge your U.S. Representative to co-sponsor Congressman Scott Garrett’s bill, the LEARN Act (H.B. 3177). We have 13 months, the rest of the 110th Congress to get this bill passed. Congressman Garrett already has 36 cosponsors for this legislation already.