Since everyone acknowledges the problem, it gives us an opportunity to enact comprehensive reforms. Our schools must be accountable to students, parents, and policy makers. At the same time, teachers should not be made scapegoats for problems in education. It is a problem for which we will all bear some form of responsibility. A recent poll by the Public Policy Institute of California shows that Californians still consider education their top concern.
Education is the governor s top priority, too.
A special session of the Legislature has been called to address his proposals. However, while the governor expressed intentions to take a high expectations approach, his proposed legislative package as instead take the safe, well-traveled road of small, incremental measures that Sacramento has always relied upon to fix our schools. This approach has not worked in the past, and there is no reason to believe it will work now. At face value, many of the governor s proposals seem to fit the bill. He attempts to address accountability by offering a four-point program.