Connecticut has filed a federal lawsuit over NCLB:
The lawsuit, filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Hartford against federal Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, asks a judge to declare that state and local funds cannot be used to meet the goals of the law."We in Connecticut do a lot of testing already, far more than most other states. Our taxpayers are sagging under the crushing costs of local education," said Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell. "What we don't need is a new laundry list of things to do _ with no new money to do them."
The lawsuit raises the stakes in a fight between states and the Bush administration over the law, and experts say legislatures across the country will be watching the case carefully. Experts expect that states could vote to join the lawsuit or file their own.
The suit's chief claim focuses on a clause in the 2001 law that says states and districts will not have to spend their own money to meet its requirements.
This isn't the first place this is happening:
The state is not the first entity to sue in response to No Child Left Behind. The National Education Association, a national teacher's union, filed a lawsuit last spring on behalf of local districts and 10 state union chapters, including Connecticut...In Utah, the state legislature passed a measure defying the federal law, and it was signed by Gov. Jon Huntsman on May 2. The law gives state educational standards priority over the requirements of No Child Left Behind.
One local Republican paper notes that, "According to a recent report, every state except Alabama, Delaware and New York is fighting the law in some way."
Update:Blogs for Bush, on the right, say they've debunked Connecticut's claims before. And Folkbum, on the left, asks some good questions.
Update #2: Whoa, just found out that the Connecticut Department of Education linked N2P. That's kinda cool.
Posted by kswygert at August 23, 2005 06:32 AM