Throwing the Book: Is Prison Too Harsh for Atlanta School Cheating Scandal?

[Martinus]

But then NCLB is fucking insane anyway.  There's no legitimate Federal role in education in the first place.

Wow, that went from 100 to 0 in a hurry.

I don't disagree with him, in theory.

Of course, if you want the feds to have no role, then the feds have to provide no funding, and you make it up elsewhere.

But as long as the feds (or the state for that matter) is providing funds, then of course they are going to provide controls as well. In fact, it would be terrible otherwise. The worst way to do it would be to have different people providing the funds from the people running the schools. No accountability in that case to see that the funds are allocated properly, and you have a system ripe for corruption where you have weak local structures to prevent it.

You can't have your cake and eat it as well, right?

Again I am not sure I understand the point - but federal funding or not, I think it is in the public interest that, say, an A grade from biology on a high school diploma from Tennesee means, roughly speaking, the same training and knowledge as an A grade from biology on a high school diploma from New York.

I don't see how you can achieve that unless curriculum standards are set up at the federal level.

[Berkut]

But then NCLB is fucking insane anyway.  There's no legitimate Federal role in education in the first place.

Wow, that went from 100 to 0 in a hurry.

I don't disagree with him, in theory.

Of course, if you want the feds to have no role, then the feds have to provide no funding, and you make it up elsewhere.

But as long as the feds (or the state for that matter) is providing funds, then of course they are going to provide controls as well. In fact, it would be terrible otherwise. The worst way to do it would be to have different people providing the funds from the people running the schools. No accountability in that case to see that the funds are allocated properly, and you have a system ripe for corruption where you have weak local structures to prevent it.

You can't have your cake and eat it as well, right?

Again I am not sure I understand the point - but federal funding or not, I think it is in the public interest that, say, an A grade from biology on a high school diploma from Tennesee means, roughly speaking, the same training and knowledge as an A grade from biology on a high school diploma from New York.

I don't see how you can achieve that unless curriculum standards are set up at the federal level.

I think that consistent meaning is useful, and I agree that if you want to have that there must be some kind of consistent curriculum. But it just one desirable thing, it isn't necessarily the only desirable thing.

As someone whose kids go to a high performing school, for example, I don't want anyone coming along and screwing with them. They know what they are doing, and I am not at all confident that it would serve my local school children's interests to have higher level "standards" imposed. How do you balance those competing interests?

[Razgovory]

This is just insane.  There shouldn't be an offense that carries any jail time--you should just lose your job and pay a fine.

But then NCLB is fucking insane anyway.  There's no legitimate Federal role in education in the first place.

Of course there is.  Without federal oversite Mississippi will be teaching it's kids that the Flintstones is a documentary.

To start with, that's bullshit, and you know it.  And it doesn't address the fact that the Constitution doesn't give the Federal government the authority to exercise oversight of state education systems.

Not Bullshit.  Let me ask you, who what ended mandatory prayer in schools in Mississippi?  What ended Segregation in Mississippi schools?  What ever that power is, should probably be given some influence over the schools in Mississippi.

[alfred russel]

Again I am not sure I understand the point - but federal funding or not, I think it is in the public interest that, say, an A grade from biology on a high school diploma from Tennesee means, roughly speaking, the same training and knowledge as an A grade from biology on a high school diploma from New York.

I don't see how you can achieve that unless curriculum standards are set up at the federal level.

In reality, students in Tennessee have a different curriculum than students in New York, and not only the content but the actual classes taken will be different, as will graduation standards.

Further, public universities are state institutions. So in general, a student from Tennessee will be heavily subsidized to go to a public university in Tennessee, but will pay through the nose to go to a university in New York (and vice versa).

[The Minsky Moment]

Seven years for racketeering is probably not extreme...but calling cheating on a exam racketeering is just fucking stupid.

Beating the drum again - there's RICO for you.  It can be employed as expansively as a judge will let a creative prosecutor get away with.  Put that all power into a local DA's hands, and sooner or later some kind of over-reaching will occur.

[dps]

But then NCLB is fucking insane anyway.  There's no legitimate Federal role in education in the first place.

Wow, that went from 100 to 0 in a hurry.

I don't disagree with him, in theory.

Of course, if you want the feds to have no role, then the feds have to provide no funding, and you make it up elsewhere.

But as long as the feds (or the state for that matter) is providing funds, then of course they are going to provide controls as well. In fact, it would be terrible otherwise. The worst way to do it would be to have different people providing the funds from the people running the schools. No accountability in that case to see that the funds are allocated properly, and you have a system ripe for corruption where you have weak local structures to prevent it.

You can't have your cake and eat it as well, right?

Again I am not sure I understand the point - but federal funding or not, I think it is in the public interest that, say, an A grade from biology on a high school diploma from Tennesee means, roughly speaking, the same training and knowledge as an A grade from biology on a high school diploma from New York.

I don't see how you can achieve that unless curriculum standards are set up at the federal level.

The point is that in our system, the Federal government is only supposed to have those powers granted to it by the Constitution, and there's nothing in the Constitution that gives it any authority whatsoever over education.  Each state has its own education system.

Over the last 50 years or so, the Federal government has de facto taken on authority in a lot of areas, not just education, over which the Constitution gives it no authority, by what amounts to bribery.  State and local governments now get a significant portion of their operating funds from the Feds, and that allows the Feds to determine policy on things it doesn't actually have authority over (the states have to do it the Feds' way, or the Feds take away the Federal funding).

And even with the Federal government worming its way into things it's not supposed to have power over, even now school curriculums aren't set by the Feds--there is no nation-wide standardized curriculum. 

[Ideologue]

On one hand, they committed crimes that subverted the State.  On the other, the State is defending what I am assured is a failed and stupid policy.  So I'm really conflicted, which manifests as indifference.