Ed Reform at 17: O'Sullivan

O'Sullivan (who was in the legislature at the time): references Mark Roosevelt "who everyone loved to hate"
references Reville who worked "to write it"
"the politics were nasty at that time with regards to funding"
"coming off of Prop 2 1/2...we were talking about overrides, a sales tax...a real skittishness because you have to pay for it"
"what I found was that everyone wanted to give out the money, but no one wanted to deal with the accountability"
"my question is 'what's wrong with that'"
"funding was important, coming off of Prop 2 1/2"
"setting statewide standards for schools and for districts...I had a lot of my friends who were part of the education establishment who" didn't like that
"I understand that the status quo is difficult..the money was not coming forward unless the accountability was in there"
(this misses the gap between the original law, which called for a comprehensive assessment system, and the MCAS, which came in for 1999, which was anything but. The major pushback by teachers, parents, and others dates from the latter.)
``we watered that down...the drumbeat of that school was the principal..I think we missed the boat on that, and that's an important factor"
"we had a chance of reform special education..that's where money is being taken out of the system...far too many kids...the legal language" allows too many kids in special ed (he thinks)
(that's interesting...who is he going to take out of special ed?)
accountability needs to be tweaked
"it's not too much for the taxpayer to say 'here's your money, here's what you're getting for it'"