Can a Presidential Election Help Education?

As I was reading some articles on the Republican debates that took place earlier this week, I thought to myself,  where is all the much needed attention on education reform?  Turns out, it falls well short of other seemingly more important topics, fixing the economy, job creation, and whether or not taxes should be raised, changed, cut or otherwise.  It was time for a quick and easy investigation.  I went to the websites of the top six candidates from the Republican Party to see what they might have to say for themselves that the media doesn't have time to focus on.

The results:

• Mitt Romney - Education is not listed as an issue

• Michele Bachmann - Education is not listed as an issue

• Rick Perry - Education is not listed as an issue

• Newt Gingrich - Education not listed as an issue

• Ron Paul - Shut down the Dept of Education and encourage homeschooling/private schooling

• Herman Cain - Localize education, remove federal government interference, let teachers and administrators fix things

My reaction: wow.

At a time when President Obama admits that NCLB didn't work the way it was planned, states are clamoring for funding and education reform is on the minds of many, how can it not be an issue large enough to garner a single sentence on a political candidates website?

As for the issues they deem more important than education, perhaps they would benefit from reading some timely articles about the jobs Americans aren't qualified to fill.  This ABC News article details companies that would love to invest in the United States, but have to train all of the employees themselves because they do not graduate with the skills required.  Or perhaps this article from the Times of India which shows jobs that already exist in the U.S. but take months to fill due to lack of qualified workers.

President Obama's American Jobs Act includes pieces that will provide money to hire workers to rebuild and upgrade American schools as well as money to keep teachers from being laid off.  Is this going to just increase our debt? According to the White House it's all paid for by our other major issue: Taxes (another post simply on this debate would be long enough as it is so I'll hold my tongue).  Whether or not you agree with the President's proposal, he, at least, is attempting to fix our broken schools as a method of keeping people employed.

So, to answer the question posed in the title of this article: No.  At least, not currently.  The only people running with a plan have a plan that says: Somethings wrong, let's ditch the whole thing and let states/towns fix it themselves.  We'll see how that works out...

-MB