http://www.jsonline.com/news/education/51706887.html

Remember the federal stimulus bill?  A $700 billion pork-laden monstrosity that basically amounted to pay-back for every Democratic special interest group and did not do much to focus on job creation and alleviating the hardship for people out of work?

I remember Scott Walker talking about Wisconsin should be thoughtful about what we took from the stimulus, especially money that had “strings attached”–that would mandate future spending.  He said that it may be that the opportunity for cash outweighed the on-going obligations for that money.   Walker urged the state to look at our true preferences instead of racing to get the money without regard to the requirements or strings attached.

 I remember the debate and I remember meeting 80 people at Karma in January for a CYP event to help rally the troops after Walker was roundly criticized for being willing to throw away money at a time when the state needed it.

Now Barak Obama has released a $4 billion program that will essentially reward (bribe?) states that make certain changes in education.  I don’t know all of the specifics, but at least one of the changes is that the state has to have a pay-for-performance aspect (merit pay).  Wisconsin apparently has a statute that forbids the use of our state standardized tests for determining outcomes for teachers.  Obama’s education secretary called this “ridiculous”–his word (I understand that the details to how this money will be rewarded are kind of murky, which is how the federal government likes to hand out money these days–less work, more discretionary power, and nobody can appeal the decisions).

I support merit pay and pay for performance.  The statistics are undeniable that we can figure out which teachers increase their students’ test scores.  To those people who say that test scores aren’t important and that teachers will teach to the test….  I think they ought to be a little more realistic–huge prizes on our society are being handed out on the basis of standardized test scores (like my job).  Maybe you think the world should be run differently (I do), but that’s reality.

But the teachers union does not (some of those people who attacked Walker for not wanting to take the stimulus are now advocating adopting the educational reforms because they believe in them–that’s great).   To me, it will be very interesting if Walker’s most vociferous critics (among them public union employees) will now advocate that the state does exactly what the Department of Education wants (race to the top!)–even if it means adopting reforms they really don’t agree with and believe would be bad for the state in the long run.  It seems to me the logic of their criticism of Walker demands that Wisconsin race to do what it takes to get the federal money.