but will keep paying them nonetheless.

Support for renewing No Child Left Behind with minimal changes is down from a year ago, from 57 percent to 50 percent, according to a brand new poll by Education Next (where I serve as executive editor). Confidence in public schools is also dipping, particularly among minority groups, with just 20 percent of African-Americans giving the schools an A or B--down from 27 percent last year. And both African-Americans and Hispanics express significantly greater faith in local police departments than in local public schools. (This is true for whites too, though to a lesser degree.) So the next time the Phi Delta Kappan reports that Americans love their public schools, keep in mind that they love their police departments even more.

As for whom the public trusts to fix the schools, the Democrats have re-opened their wide lead on the issue. From the press release:

• Sixty-one percent of respondents rate the Democrats' record on education more favorably, and 62 percent think them more likely to improve the public schools.
• Teachers prefer the Democrats by even larger margins, as do Hispanics and African Americans.
• Democrats and Republicans both tend to favor members of their party when it comes to education, but they do so with varying levels of conviction. Whereas self-identified Democrats prefer their own party on education by margins of roughly 10 to 1, Republicans do so by margins of just 3 to 1. This marks a departure from the pattern observed in 2000, when polls compiled by political scientist Patrick McGuinn showed that only 44 percent of Americans thought that the Democrats would do a better job of improving education, compared with 41 percent who favored the GOP in this area. The Education Next-PEPG 2008 findings reveal a return to the patterns seen in the 1980s and 1990s, when voters consistently favored the Democrats on education by margins of 20 percentage points or more.

President Bush set out to improve America's public schools--and to ensure that his Republican Party got credit for it. According to the public at least, he failed on both counts.

From that Ed Next poll, this caught my eye:

Race- and Income-based School Integration

Education Next/PEPG survey results show that 63 percent of the public are opposed to assigning students to schools based on racial background in order to promote school diversity, a practice banned by the Supreme Court in 2007.

• Only 16 percent say that districts "definitely" or "probably" should be allowed to take students' racial background into account; 21 percent of the public are unsure.
• Among African Americans, only 30 percent think districts should be allowed to take race into account.
• Surprisingly, on the question of assigning students to schools based on family income--a strategy now being considered by many districts as an alternative to race-based policies--the opposition is even greater. Only 13 percent support the idea; 62 percent are opposed and the remainder uncertain.

Mike links to this fascinating article by Matt Bai in yesterday's NYT and asks us to consider whether the ???end of black politics??? is good for education reform.?? Obviously, one must first agree with Bai's primary assumption that ???old black politics???--the civil rights kind--is essentially on its way out. He says Obama and other new-generation black leaders aren't comfortable categorizing their politics by race. Cory Booker for instance, mayor of Newark, seems to breathe a sigh of relief at the exodus of the old guard. He says the Obama campaign ???is giving African-Americans like myself the courage to?? be themselves.???

Bai contends that the inequities in today's society aren't as blatant as the legal barriers that once existed in the civil rights movement--they are subtler now. He mentions inferior schools as an example of this subtler inequality. If Bai is right about the curtain call for black politics, I think it's good for education reform. It's absolutely true that urban schools have less able teachers and notoriously low expectations for students. But to insinuate that this phenomenon originates from the same hate-filled intentions of the 50's and 60's (the water hose footage will forever be heart-wrenching) is not only wrong, but a disservice to the kids in failing schools. ??Urban schools are currently failing students for a number of reasons but linking those reasons to bigotry only serves to deny the monumental contributions of civil rights leaders.

I taught in an urban high school once upon a time. The 50's-era building had no A/C, but it did have a metal detector and two security guards. We scored at the bottom of the district heap every year. That is, until a reform-oriented principal forced all staff to align their instruction to the district's already solid standards and assess students regularly to determine progress. Not long afterward, the entire district won the coveted Broad Prize for reducing the achievement gap.

We weren't failing those kids because they were minority children; we were failing them because we had ignored standards-based, data-driven instruction.

The first medals were awarded today, with Nordic countries--Norway, Finland, and Iceland--stealing the show. The United States--winner so far of 9 golds, 3 silvers, and 2 bronzes in the athletic competitions--has yet to take home a medal in the Education Olympics. Find more coverage at edolympics.net.

I'm curious what my colleagues think; check out Matt Bai's New York Times Magazine piece on the inter-generational battle going on within the black political elite. This is the heart of his argument:

In this way, post-Black Power politicians like [Philadelphia Mayor Michael] Nutter and [Newark Mayor Cory] Booker embody the principal duality of modern black America. On one hand, they are the most visible examples of the highly educated, entrepreneurial and growing black middle class that cultural markers like "The Cosby Show" first introduced to white Americans in the 1980s. According to an analysis by Pew's Economic Mobility Project, almost 37 percent of black families fell into one of the three top income quintiles in 2005, compared with 23 percent in 1973. At the same time, though, these black leaders are constantly confronted in their own cities and districts by blighted neighborhoods that are predominately black, places where poverty collects like standing water, breeding a host of social contagions.

That both of these trend lines can exist at once poses some difficult questions for black leaders and institutions. Back in the heyday of the civil rights movement, the evils and objectives were relatively clear: there were discriminatory laws in place that denied black Americans their rights as citizens, and the goal was to get those laws repealed and to pass more progressive federal legislation at the same time. You marched and you rallied and--if you had the bravery of a James Clyburn or a John Lewis--you endured blows to the head and to the spirit, and eventually the barriers started to fall. Things become more complicated, and more confounding, however, when those legal barriers no longer exist and when millions of black Americans are catapulting themselves to success. Now the inequities in the society are subtler--inferior schools, an absence of employers, a dearth of affordable housing--and the remedies more elusive.

I'll weigh in later.

"Uptick in 'No Child' failures largely due to suburban schools"

* As well as the thinking behind last year's aborted attempt to rewrite the law.

Take a look at the text of an invitation that landed in my inbox a few hours ago, and tell me this isn't new and different:

JOIN THE ED CHALLENGE FOR CHANGE

On the eve of the Democratic National Convention, many of the nation's top progressive education reform groups will be convening a forum in Denver to highlight the growing consensus for a bold new direction in federal education policy--and to spotlight the exciting work of a new generation of reformers who are already making change happen on the ground across America.

We invite you to join us for this important discussion and hear the Challenge for Change we will be issuing to the Democratic Party leadership to push for a truly innovative, 21st century education agenda.

So who are "the nation's top progressive education reform groups" that are convening this forum? Have a gander:

Democrats for Education Reform; The Education Equality Project; Daniels Fund; Piton Foundation; Center for African American Policy at the University of Denver; New Schools Venture Fund; Education Reform Now; Education Trust; Ed In '08; Progressive Policy Institute; School of Public Affairs at the University of Colorado; National Association of Charter School Authorizers; National Council of La Raza; Public Education & Business Coalition; Massachusetts 2020;?? Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound; Citizens Commission on Civil Rights; Center for American Progress; Donnell-Kay Foundation; Colorado League of Charter Schools; A+ Denver; Colorado Children's Campaign; PICO National Network; Metro Organizations for People; Padres U??idos; Denver School of Science and Technology; The Odyssey School; GetSmart Schools; Denver Venture School; Center for Policy Entrepreneurship; Manual High School; West Denver Preparatory Charter; AXL Academy *

I don't do political conventions, so I won't be attending this event, but the optimist in me thinks this is a very significant, and healthy, development--both for the Democratic party and for American education politics writ large. At the same time, I suspect that the "bold new direction in federal education policy" that the group will propose will be neither bold nor new, but will amount to a call for more federal mandates and more federal spending. What would be bold and new is for Democrats to be more humble about Uncle Sam's abilities to make education reform happen. But that's a fight for another day.

* I notice that Education Sector is missing. Is it not considered among "the nation's top progressive education reform groups"? Or does it still consider itself an "independent" analyst and not an advocate for any particular position? Strange.

My gambit this morning didn't work to spark a full-fledged office debate, but I did entice Amber to respond to my prompt about whether the "end of black politics" is good for school reform. And I'm glad she did, because her post is characteristically thoughtful and illuminating. Amber, we miss your blogging! (Yes, we all have day jobs, and in Amber's case a pipeline full of interesting research studies in need of tending.)

My answer to this question is unequivocal: yes, it's great for school reform that the old-line civil rights groups are losing their monopoly as spokespeople for the "black community" and that new leaders such as Cory Booker are rising to power and influence. Partly that's because the Bookers of the world tend to be much more open to school choice and other promising reforms (though there are always exceptions; see Deval Patrick for instance). But mostly that's because the traditional civil rights groups have been in bed with the teachers unions forever, muting their advocacy for change.

And maybe it's the rise of a new generation of leadership that is forcing the civil rights community to start to break with the unions. (My friend Rick Hess credits NCLB for driving a stake between the civil rights groups and the unions; that's probably true, too.) Al Sharpton might represent the "old black politics," but his Educational Equity Project is all about the new.

For years, black voters have expressed support for greater parental choice, more accountability, and meaningful reform of our schools. And for years, many black politicians opposed these policies, marching in lockstep with the unions. So yes, let the new black politics begin, because it's good for education reform--which is really good for black children (along with everybody else).

Are we really this far gone? The Wall Street Journal announced this morning, "Problem: Boys Don't Like to Read. Solution: Books That Are Really Gross." I salute the WSJ for this particular syntactic masterpiece of a headline, but let's not jump on the bandwagon because we want to use the word "gross" on Page One.

I can understand why boys may not dig Charlotte's Web or Little House on the Prairie, but there are plenty of other children's or young adult books geared towards the rougher sex. What about The Jungle Book or some of Grimm's scarier fairy tales? Plenty of children's books are not about bunnies and rainbows--but are still age-appropriate for 5-, 6-, 7-year-olds. Yes, you might be keeping your son from blowing things up on his PlayStation, but isn't reading a book about blowing things up just as bad? I would argue that the nuance of the English language and the rampant imagination of a typical child would make reading about something gory and inappropriate worse than seeing it on television.

The moral of the story is simply that we need to get all kids to keep reading, not by writing books that make them into adults that much sooner, but by being active and engaging parents who can relate The Pushcart War (a favorite!) to the contemporary world. This is about parents taking the easy way out, not about classic literature being outdated.