Post-SOTU

Yesterday, David wrote about the White House's enhanced SOTU-website.  Full text of the speech here. White House fact sheets here and here.  The Washington Post provides a fun way to compare this year's speech to previous years.  Word clouds at the bottom depict the frequency of words used for the entire speech and also just the education section. 

Rep. Kline issued a statement after the speech.  Education Insider co-publisher Andy Rotherham offers some reactions to the speech here and here.  EdWeek's coverage here.

I thought it was generally a good speech, but was surprised at the rather lukewarm call for ESEA reauthorization.  It was stronger than last year's, but still rather tepid and lacking any real details other than increasing the number of STEM teachers.  It's not surprising that 56% of our Insiders think ESEA reauthorization will be delayed until 2013.

This line also puzzled me, "That's why instead of just pouring money into a system that's not working, we launched a competition called Race to the Top."   Technically, most of the stimulus funds were poured into a system that isn't working - through Title I and other forumula programs. And the EduJobs bill poured $10 billion - more than two times the size of RttT - into supporting the status quo instead of adopting a cleantech approach of funding new innovations or scaling charters schools or online learning providers.    

Following the speech, Kalpen Modi from the White House Office of Public Engagement held an online townhall with several White House staff including Roberto Rodrigue, Special Assistant to the President for Education Policy, who talks about education at the 2:45; 12:35; and 27:23 marks.