Meet the Press talks with Arne Duncan

$4.3 Billion is what is being offered to states in a com­pe­ti­tion for edu­ca­tion fund­ing.  David Gregory asks Secretary Arne Duncan to explain how this unprece­dented amount of money will ulti­mately achieve higher edu­ca­tion stan­dards for every­one in his inter­view which was broad­cast on MSNBC on Sunday, November 15, 2009.  The key behind the Race to the Top pro­gram seems to be that states are only awarded the money once they prove that they are seri­ous about reform.  The money will be dis­trib­uted among those states that can demon­strate dras­tic, bold reforms.  Competition is expected to be stiff. 

Gregory goes one step fur­ther by ask­ing if a Democratic President, who relies on the sup­port of the teacher’s unions, is really going to insist on enforc­ing account­abil­ity mea­sures.   The answer is sim­ple.  Student achieve­ment is the pur­pose of edu­ca­tion. “We need to start to focus on out­comes, not inputs…We are only going to invest in those places that are doing the right thing by children.”