CodePink Memphis & Dept. of Education

Brava, to Nancy Bailey, Kara Freeman, and Terri Rice for going up against the Department of Education over the No Child Left Behind Act in Collierville, on April 10th. Nancy passed out leaflets, covering the problems with NCLB while Terri and Kara wore the pink, holding signs that read, "At Least Bush is Winning the War on Education" and "Education is Not Memorization" and "Books Not Bombs". In the meeting, they caught the Undersecretary of Education, Keri Briggs, and the local staff of Rep. Marsha Blackburn off guard, with pointed questions on NCLB. Terri raised the question of the necessity of including in NCLB, the requirement of high schools to make available private information on all Junior and Senior students to military recruiters. Ms. Briggs and Rep. Blackburn's staff was quick to respond, that NCLB did no such thing, but it was required under the legislation from 1965 (ESEA).

Here is the response, by email, to Ms. Briggs on the matter:

Dear Ms. Briggs,

I'd like to thank you for attending the Collierville, TN Town Hall Meeting and give us a chance to express our concerns with NCLB.

I'm writing you, so that you can hopefully clarify a question I had and the answer that was given to me by you and Marsha Blackburn's staff. My question was pertaining to the inclusion in the NCLB requiring high schools to provide military recruiters with the personal information of all Junior and Senior High School students. The way I understood the answer that was given to me, was that it was not included, but was under another piece of legislation, the ESEA, from 1965.

I did some digging on the Dept. of Education website today, because I have always understood the requirement to be part of NCLB. I found a letter from Donald Rumsfeld and then Secretary of Education, Rod Paige. I have attached that letter, dated October 9, 2002, in which is states, "Recognizing the challenges faced by military recruiters, Congress recently passed legislation that requires high schools to provide military recruiters, upon request, access to secondary students and directory information on those students. Both the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002 reflect these requirements." They, Rumsfeld and Paige, then go on to discuss the enclosed guidelines for "compliance with the new laws."

This seems to me to indicate that it is indeed a requirement of NCLB to inform military recruiters, contrary to the information given to me by you, and Marsha Blackburn's staff on April 10, 2007, in Collierville, TN.

I would appreciate your response in this matter to clear up my obvious confusion with two contradictory bits of information coming out of the Department of Education.

I'm sending this to my district's congressman as well, Rep. Steve Cohen, so that he can also be aware of, and possibly assist me in, this matter.

Sincerely,

Teresa Rice

This is the way in which the government and it's officials are misleading the public on many different matters from Education, to War, to the Environment. It is up to us to stand up and be heard, to require accountability and answers.

As an interesting side note, Undersecretary of Education, Briggs grew up in Midland, TX and Secretary of Education, Spelling's husband was responsible to assisting "W" out of his military responsibilities during the Vietnam War.