Good question and considering his years in "community outreach" where in he relates to the poor levels of education in his books and while campaigning for senator.
I cannot see any issue more tailor made for made real change, and one that has a head start and can get pushed over the edge into the mainstream, with the added advantage, that it will create a viable outlet for kids caught in urban environments that need it most and that is working and is viable and one in which with his full backing, if spoken to could win converts across the aisles. Time to walk the walk.




School Choice Is Change You Can Believe In
June 17, 2008; Page A21
Barack and Michelle Obama send their children to an upscale private school. When asked about it during last year's YouTube debate, Sen. Obama responded that it was "the best option" for his children.

Several hundred low-income parents in our nation's capital have also sent their children to private and parochial schools, with the help of a federal program that provides Opportunity Scholarships. Like Mr. and Mrs. Obama, most of these parents are African-American. And like Mr. and Mrs. Obama, they too believe the schools they've chosen represent the "best option" for their children.

Now these parents have a question for Mr. Obama. Is Mr. Change-You-Can-Believe-In going to let his fellow Democrats take away the one change that is working for them?

Just a few days ago, Democrat Eleanor Holmes Norton (D.C.'s congressional delegate) told the Washington Post that "the Democratic Congress is not about to extend this program." Today that program will come under the congressional spotlight, when a House subcommittee takes up the annual appropriations bill for the District of Columbia that includes funding for Opportunity Scholarships for the 2009-10 school year. If Mrs. Norton and her allies in the teachers unions have their way, hundreds of African-American children with these scholarships will be forced back into one of the most miserable public school systems in the United States.

Just how rotten are the D.C. public schools? In a recent survey by Education Week, the D.C. public schools ranked fourth from the bottom in terms of graduation rates. Test scores for basics like math and reading are also near the bottom. It's not for lack of money: A recent U.S. Census Bureau report says the district school spending clocks in at more than $13,400 per child -- third highest in the nation. It takes a lot of money to run a school system as lousy as D.C.'s.

This dismal performance helps explain why so many have been willing to cross the usual political and ideological lines to try to give the district's kids a better shot at a decent education. Opportunity Scholarships have been endorsed by both the Washington Post and Washington Times. They have the support of the Republican president as well as the current and past Democratic mayors -- Adrian Fenty and Anthony Williams.

Even some of Mr. Obama's Democratic colleagues -- e.g., California's Dianne Feinstein -- have said that D.C. should be allowed to give the program a chance. In contrast, Mr. Obama's silence is thundering across the district.

This silence is all the more striking, given that the Ivy League-educated Democrat puts education reform at the top of his agenda. He has decried the "achievement gap" that is leaving African-American children behind. He has also noted -- rightly -- that America's system of public education is producing hundreds of thousands of children who will be condemned to the margins of American prosperity because they do not have the tools they need to succeed.

The question is whether, to paraphrase Hillary Clinton, Mr. Obama offers these children anything more than a good speech. It's true that Mr. Obama has endorsed merit pay, and in the past has suggested that schools should be able to sack bad teachers. But apart from a few feints and jabs around the margins, his proposals would do little to challenge a status quo that today serves teachers unions at the expense of students.

Back in D.C., those who have benefited from Opportunity Scholarships hope that the Democrat's presidential nominee will stand up for them. Tiffany Dunston used her Opportunity Scholarship to attend Archbishop Carroll High School, and graduated earlier this month as class valedictorian. Miss Dunston plans to attend today's markup session on Capitol Hill. She says she'd like Mr. Obama to "stand up" -- so more kids could get a chance for a good education.

Carleen McCarley hopes for the same. She looks at the Opportunity Scholarship that will allow her daughter Gabrielle to attend Metropolitan Day School as a lifeline. "I have a friend who does some work for Obama," she says, "and I tell her she needs to keep putting this in his ear."

April Cole-Walton hopes the candidate will be listening. Thanks to an Opportunity scholarship, her daughter, Breanna, will enter fourth grade this fall at St. Peter's Interparish School -- a safe and caring environment where she can learn. "If I could talk to Senator Obama," Ms. Cole-Walton says, "I would say, 'Give me a choice and give my daughter a chance.'"

These people have change they can believe in. The question is whether Mr. Obama will help them keep it. Or whether he'll be one more Beltway pol who speaks eloquently about public schools -- while making sure his own kids never have to step inside one.

Main Street - WSJ.com

__________________
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile....

he will not support school choice, he's stated this already.

good for me but not for thee...

A democrat, support school choice?

__________________
"My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you'll join with me as we try to
change it." -- Barack Obama

not for long if ever, the NEA will see to that.

What would he, as the President, have to do with this issue?

__________________

Everything, it was Bush who got no child left behind enacted. The office of the president and first lady have always been involved with trying to better educate our children.

The NEA who is against this program is a failure and needs to be abolished.

It doesn't have everything to do with it. Education is a local issue, and has been traditionally handled that way. The only reason the feds have been able to stick their noses in is by giving money to schools (bribing them).

__________________

No child left behind was a cruel joke. Increase requirements with NO funding.

Obama will compromise here. He could just support vouchers but also require schools taking them to conform to Title IX. In fact I don't see how he can avoid it, that's the law. That would kill the idea right away, private schools, particularly Catholic, are on record already as opposing vouchers if it would require them to deal with all the types of developmentally disabled the public schools must accomodate; as well they should be, can you imagine the brothers writing IEP's

Y'all, dude does have a website, there's no need to assume or speculate as to what he thinks on these issues.

All this is from Welcome to Obama for America
This is actually much more important than "school choice" or any of that bandaid crap. The acheivement gap starts at a very young age.

And before anyone says it. Yes, it does seem these things will cost money. I don't suppose there is any hope of a debate ont he merits of these proposal instead of a whine about "but school choice is cheap!"

__________________
If you stop trying to bring the Bible into the classroom, I'll stop secretly sneaking biology textbooks into the pews on Saturday nights. Deal?

If the flag is precious to YOU, then don't burn YOURS.

About one month of Iraq ought to do it.

Unless we elect McCain, but since then we'll just be killing them at 19, why worry about education?

read

Obama Opposes McCain School Voucher Plan
And on the same day that he was extolling the need to shake up the "status quo" in education, Obama also defended his opposition to school vouchers.

"We don't have enough slots for every child to go into a parochial school or a private school. And what you would see is a huge drain of resources out of the public schools," Obama said.

McCain advocates giving every parent a voucher to essentially choose which school they'd like to send their child. Obama, whose two daughters attend private school, said that idea would crush the public school system entirely.

"But what I don't want to do is to see a diminished commitment to the public schools to the point where all we have are the hardest-to-teach kids with the least involved parents with the most disabilities in the public schools," he said. "That's going to make things worse, and we're going to lose the commitment to public schools that I think have been so important to building this country."

I definitely agree with after school activities etc…but theres nothing on there on school choice i.e. charter schools.

I don't give a shit about the money, we are throwing wads of money into the Public system furnace now for little gain, these kids are the ones who need it most. Band aid crap huh? what a riot, so just let it go on, 10 yhears , 25, 35, 45...yea things are lo9ng up, d=gradtatuiontaes for black high scholl ,ales was 73% in 1966, whats it now? Lets just keep throwing money at the same old system no, we cannot try anytuing else becaus eht phone banks, the contgributions the door kn ockers wiull disappear come election time and we cannt hjave that...what a fucking sell out, his own peopple too...this aint whitye now there pal, this is one of "your own".
What? it takes a upper middle class white man, who went mainly to private schools to argue for the merits of putting kids in schools ( jesus Christ the world is backwards I mean why should I as rich whitey give a shit right? my kids are safe and graduated) that;
a) perform b) provide a safe disciplined environment c) costs less d) parents to the tune of 88% love for those reasons stated and the added by prodcut being studies now show that they have a net positive effect on the surrounding public school system by making them raise the bar on themselves. ….

DC spends 13k a head what did the articles say? 3rd from the bottom, in the nation, the schools are abysmal, you can put a kid in earlier, later don't matter. Do I need to post more oecd stats that show the longer our kids spend in school the less aptitude, which is tested and found ready and able to be molded is by the time they get through k-12 sadly unutilized or unrealized, in short the longer they are in these schools, the dumber they get comparatively with other systems in other nations as well.

Band aid crap huh? What a riot, so just let it go on, what 10 years , 25, 35, 40...yea things are looking up!!!Graduation rates for black high school males was 76.5% and 81% for females in the period 1962-64 what’s it now? Graduation rates for students who attend school in poverty stricken, racially segregated, and urban school districts lag from 18 to 22% behind their peers, go team go.
Please.

Fankly the idea of giving todays public school system access to my children early than necessary scares me. Rob Reiner aka- meat head, tried this out here in California and it went down in flames.


Charter schools, that’s the issue in this topic, will he sppt. it? Apparently not as he does not say so or allude to such in the blurb you posted. Then let him put his money where his mouth is, or that his kids were his politics’ and platforms are, in the DC public school system…..yea, when I get my third set of teeth….then again what public schools did he attend?


The last 2 DC Mayors came around and so did grass roots sppters, but no, Norton Holmes , who’s kids btw have attended private schools, the DC rep. in the house says this is it…..I frankly am pissed but not surprised, your “own” have blowing been blowing “your own” up since 66….so whats new.


this is truly unfucking believable to me...unfucking believable...

__________________
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile....

that is a fucking out and out lie and I have heard this before, There are NO scholastics qualifications, they do not "take cream off the top"...they get the most motivated parents who sign up quickest and get thier kids in..his resources arguement is bullshit too, only 35% of funds per pupil is allowed to a voucher child, that still leaves 65% for a student they no longer have attending.

The idea is to make sure there are never enough slots.....pathetic.

__________________
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile....

if you are beholden to the NEA, you have to say something...
and make no mistake, BHO has taken the union position every time.

All of us know that a dramatic spike in worldwide oil prices has pushed the cost of gasoline to $4 a gallon and even more, and made energy a domestic political issue in a way it has not been since the days of the Arab oil embargo of the 1970s. And for reducing our dependence on foreign oil the present Republican presidential contender, Sen. J. McCain has proposed to set the USA on a course to build 45 new nuclear reactors by 2030 with a longer-term goal of adding another 55 in the future.
Indeed, the 104 nuclear reactors currently operating around the country produce about 20% of the nation’s annual electricity needs.
But what about solving numerous problems of moving and storing nuclear materials that will need a very high level of safeguarding in growing threat of possible terrorist attacks? And all this is proposed in conditions when we have not built a single nuclear plant in over 30 years, and our manufacturing base to even construct these plants is almost gone! Well, I declare!
There is ample evidence that McCain’s calls, devoted to such panicky issue as energy one, is the next pre-election trick of the Republican presidential nominee with the aim of gaining our confidence and winning election race!