As promised earlier this week, I will attempt to outline McCain’s plan for education. It begins with the moto “Excellence, Choice, and Competition in American Education”.

One thing I noticed right off the bat when beginning my McCain research – and this observation is made with no bias towards either party – that his website clearly lacks the organization and design elements of Obama’s. With that said, let’s move on.

Flowery speech and patriotic words are abundant in McCain’s spiel on education, but here are the main points I took from it.

• McCain states there is a need to enact meaningful reform in education

• The education system must provide for equity of choice

• We must empower parents

• We must empower teachers

I realize that those points are extremely broad and not well described. Again, no bias here, just disappointment in a politician’s use of fancy speech with little bang for the buck. Now let’s get to McCain’s plan for strengthening America’s schools.

McCain’s Education Principles

• Build upon the lessons of No Child Left Behind

Place more of an emphasis on standards and accountability and the goal cannot be group averages.

• Provide effective education leadership

Invest in the people, parents and reward achievement.

• Ensure that children have quality

This includes several mini plans:

1. Encourage alternative certification methods to get more teachers through the door

2. Provide teachers with bonuses who locate in underperforming schools and demonstrate leadership as measured by student improvement

3. Provide funding for professional development programs for teachers

4. Empower school principles with greater control over spending

• Give parents greater choice

Parents will have more control over the money used in NCLB

• Expand D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program

Expand the budget to $20 million and serve an additional 1,000 families.

• Access to High Quality tutoring programs

Give schools more money for tutoring programs. (Why don’t they just use GlobalScholar?)

• Expand virtual learning

Build more virtual schools and increase the offerings of online courses. (Again, why not use GlobalScholar?)

• Allocate $250 million to a grant program to states with expanding online education opportunities

• Offer $250 million for digital passport scholarships for student to pay for online courses

I encourage you to read more about McCain’s education plan and get a feel for all that he wants to achieve. In a nutshell, I would say that while I love the direction he is taking toward online education, I am disappointed with his organizational skills and use of empty diction.

Here is a clip of yesterday’s episode of The View were McCain spoke with the ladies on Obama’s recent lipstick comment, Roe vs. Wade and the separation of church and state.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoQ_G6eMJAQ]

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