Presidential campaigns tune up education policies

The presumed November matchup produced by the long presidential-primary season that ended last week offers contrasting approaches to K-12 policy, along with some common ground on the basics of the No Child Left Behind Act.

Senator John McCain of Arizona, the presumptive Republican nominee, and Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, who last week secured enough delegates to claim the Democratic nomination, both express support for the NCLB law’s goals and its use of testing to measure schools’ success.

But McCain would promote market forces as a way to spur school improvement, and would likely seek to freeze education spending as part of a review of the effectiveness of federal programs. Obama, meanwhile, promises to search for new ways of assessing students and to invest significantly in efforts to improve teacher quality. Read more about their takes on education issues in Education Week online.