Dive Brief:
- In a tour called "Opportunity Across America" that spanned five cities, the new acting Secretary of Education, Dr. John B. King Jr., called for greater equity in U.S. schools and for states to abandon teacher evaluation metrics that don't help educators improve.
- King also called for states to use an aggressive approach to helping the lowest-performing schools, and for schools to better integrate socioeconomically, saying "We can't allow the intervention requirements to become just a bureaucratic compliance strategy."
- He also cast the new Every Student Succeeds Act in a rosy light, saying that the new federal education plan was a fresh start.
Dive Insight:
Many are watching what, exactly, the outspoken new Education Secretary will do next.
Arne Duncan, the outgoing Ed Secretary, spoke to Education Dive last week and mentioned giving kernels of advice to King, since King has a limited amount of time and less influence with which to make his mark.
"The more that he can be laser-like focused on two or three things over the course of the next year ... if one focus is not making progress, you know, come April or May or June, you basically have to jettison it at that point," Duncan said.