Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, April 14, 1991 TAG: 9104140121
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
The wide-ranging proposal, to be announced Thursday, is a bid not only to change American education but also to seize the Democrats' best political issue.
For two years Democrats have scoffed at Bush's speeches on education while they steadily proposed bigger expenditures for existing federal programs.
The program assembled by Lamar Alexander, the new secretary of education, involves less additional money than those committees sought.
It calls for several hundred million dollars in new federal expenditures, a senior administration official said. Most would go for grants to encourage states and localities to try a broad variety of educational innovations.
The plan was still being polished this weekend after an initial version of about 200 pages won Bush's approval. It is divided into four sections, which were described by officials who insisted on not being identified.
The first section, called "better and more accountable schools," focuses on improving schools for the children in them now.
Along with national testing, some of the ideas in this area include promoting parental choices on which schools their children should attend and possibly a system in which federal aid to schools is based at least in part on their showing improvement in test scores.
The second section envisions "a new generation of American schools"; the third, "back to school," involves literacy, job skills and other forms of adult education.
The fourth section is concerned with coordinating the local, state and federal services that affect a student's schooling, from child nutrition to employment help for parents.
The administration does not expect serious opposition to its proposals initially, the officials said.
by CNB