national standards

Jay Greene:

But perhaps the strongest objection to national standards that we have repeated at JPGB (here, here, and here) is that even if the current set of proposed national standards is an improvement for some states (and less good than others), there is strong reason to fear that people opposed to sensible, rigorous standards will gain control over the newly created national standards infrastructure and be in a position to impose their nonsense on everyone. Remember that teacher unions, ed schools, and other opponents of tough standards that might expose the shortcomings of schools and teachers are much better organized and politically powerful than anyone else in education politics. Over time they will gain control of the machinery of national standards even if they do not control it now.

National Standards Nonsense Redux

And Neal McCluskey:

....Which brings us to a whole different layer of policy making, one major media wade into even less often than legislating: writing regulations. How many stories have you read, or watched on TV news, about the writing of regulations for implementing anything, education or otherwise? I’d imagine precious few, yet this is where often vaguely written statutes are transformed into on-the-ground operations. It’s also where the special interests are almost always represented — after all, they’re the ones who will be regulated — but average taxpayers and citizens? Don’t go looking for them.

Plowing Through the Defenses of National Education Standards

Until parents have a union - an organized presence, inside the political arena, as parents - national standards are going to be controlled by the organized entities that control things now: ed schools and teacher unions.

I'm pretty sure.