One of the many goals of No Child Left Behind is to decrease the “achievement gap” between rich and poor, white and minority. We already know that isn’t happening. At the center of the debate is often money. If these schools only had more of it, they could solve all their problems. In fact, the states themselves seem to generally favor NCLB if only they got a larger portion of the taxpayers’ income.

One program which aims to equal out some of the funding issues is Title I, which uses four statutory formulas to distribute federal money to low-income, local education agencies. NCLB’s pillar of “local control” actually seems to only mean that districts have a little more control over what they do with this money when they get it, not in setting curriculum, testing, teacher evaluations or any other education related decision which at one time was left up to the local school district.

The desire to redistribute some of the nation’s wealth for charitable causes actually has a long history in the United States, stretching back to George Washington’s desire to start a national university. Back then, politicians in favor of these measures were a little more savvy in their approach. They advocated selling government lands and using the money gained to fund their pet projects. Reaching into the pockets of one group of citizens in order to benefit another group was not generally seen as particularly constitutional or a desirable way to run the republic. In 1854, another similar proposal was set before President Franklin Pierce, in which government lands would be turned over to states to fund endowments for the insane. In his veto message, Franklin writes,

I can not find any authority in the Constitution for making the Federal Government the great almoner of public charity throughout the United States. To do so would, in my judgment, be contrary to the letter and spirit of the Constitution and subversive of the whole theory upon which the Union of these States is founded. — LONANG

Yes, I would have to agree that much of what No Child Left Behind seeks to accomplish is “contrary to the letter and spirit of the Constitution and subversive of the whole theory upon which the Union of these States is founded.” And as Pierce predicted, once the government involved itself in one act of philanthropy, the door was wide open for the government to involve itself in every charitable activity imaginable.

Interestingly, this Title I money isn’t even being used to serve low-income students. According to a study released by The Education Trust, it is actually causing the funding gap between rich and poor states to widen rather than close.

The program, known as Title I, is part of a slew of federal, state and local policies that direct more resources to the nation’s wealthiest children than to its poorest, the study concluded. It found that the highest-poverty school districts receive an average of $825 less each year per student in state and local funding than the wealthiest districts. It also found that state and local money often flows disproportionately to wealthy students within districts. — Washington Post

Thirteen billion dollars to enforce the status quo. That is a noble cause, worthy of disregarding the original intent of our constitution.

Senator Edward Kennedy, (D-Mass.) the incoming chairman of the Senate’s education committee and co-author of the No Child Left Behind Act says in response,

“We cannot close the education achievement gap in this country without addressing the funding gap, which keeps our low-income and minority children at a disadvantage,” he said in a written statement. “States must take responsibility for ensuring access to resources for all our children, but the federal government has to do its part as well.” — Ibid.

The state’s responsibility. The federal government’s responsibility. Some day, maybe, we will realize that we need to take personal responsibility if we want to maintain our personal liberty. The government is a poor executor of the nation’s wealth, and no longer seems to concern itself with protecting the fundamental liberties it was created to protect.