I WOULD LIKE TO SET TO MAKE SCHOOL A FULL YEAR AND STOP GIVING OUR YOUTHS A WHOLE 3 MONTHS TO DUMB DOWN.

PLEASE USE EVERY USE OF YOUR POWER TO FORCE SOME KIND OF LAW OR WHAT EVER CAN BE DONE... OUR KIDS IN THE USA ARE UNDER EDUCATED AND THE SYSTEM FOR EDUCATION IS HORRIBLE. IT MAKES ME SICK TO SEE KIDS WITH POOR EDUCATION AND THEY ARE THE FUTURE FOR THIS COUNTRY.

NO KID LEFT BEHIND......THAT WAS NEVER A HONEST MOTTO. I SEE KIDS LEFT BEHIND ALL THE TIME

With all the money spent on the wars I think it's sick that the children are educated to such a low standard. I am from California and was just reading that one in four from the Los Angeles area drop out before they graduate from high school... Priorities! Americans will support education if it's a priority. Make it one!

Save money and CLOSE this Federal Department. Leave the individual STATES decide how they will educate the students and how much they will pay the teachers. Get the FEDERAL Government out of our lives and SAVE MONEY and CUT the Federal Budget.

Do you support less federal oversight of education and the removal of the education union from positions of influence in DC?

Do you support local (county and state) level initiatives and programs, rather than federal boondoggles?

Will you push for the repeal or removal of "No Child Left Behind'?

Direct teacher student interaction is probably the best educational tool there is, so fewer teachers and larger class sizes have a significant impact on the quality of education.

Would you support a proposal that reduces the overall budget of the Department of Education, but does it by reducing budget for special programs, studies, teacher evaluation tools, student testing, etc, and offsetting that with block grants to school districts to hire more teachers, and increase teacher salaries.

The schools at a local level have already cut most of the extra expenses. Most now charge parents if their kids want to be in a sport. At high school level, art and other programs are long gone. The scary part of your proposal is if they (the Federal Government) make cuts, they will try to dictate what needs to be cut locally. I agreed with your question because I would like to hear what Secretary Duncan will say.

my wife is a teacher and she has to provide her own extra material if it isn't in the approve teaching curriculum, letting the government decide what the program is from my point of view is a bad idea

I didn't mean that the DOE cuts would be things like sports, or art-supplies at local levels. What I was thinkiing was large nation-wide programs that the DOE is spending its money on, things like No-child-left-behind, or weird educational research initiatives, or nation wide programs to figure out ways to evaluate teachers.
I didn't word it very well, but what i was trying to say is that we need more teachers, who are better paid, and have the local supplies they need, and we don't need so much nationwide projects that don't make good sense on a local level.

Really I am asking a question about Education and the Economy. The whole idea about making teachers accountable is funny coming from Politicians! Sorry but that makes me laugh.

What I suggest is giving a large portion of the "stimulus" to the education system! On the www.recovery.gov website I didn't see anything related to education in the first 10 shown which represent BILLIONS of dollars. With some simple math if you were to divide 2 Billion dollars into the average teachers pay of $40,000 per year... you could hire 50,000 teachers or about 10,000 per state! What would these new teachers do, improve our education system, spend money in our economy and give people like me hope that our Government actually is doing some serious business to improve our Country's short and long term standing in the world.

What do you think?

I hope you spend everyday in office knocking on every Senator and Congressman's door telling them that education is the best use of money we have right now.