Obama's overwhelming education focus has been getting roughly $100 billion directed to education through the American Recover and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). But spending billions upon billions to save jobs in a system that's seen huge staffing increases, skyrocketing per-pupil expenditures, but achievement stagnation is not forcing reform -- it's rewarding failure. And sure, the President and his Secretary of Education have talked a lot about connecting accountability to all that cash, but rhetoric rarely turns into real reform, especially once the money's out the door.

Thankfully, there is a way to change the system that works: Instead of giving tax dollars to public schools, let parents control the cash. Enable parents to choose schools, and force schools to respond to them. Unfortunately, in one of the most troubling episodes of Obama's first 100 days, his administration helped usher along the death of the D.C. school choice program, burying evidence of vouchers' success in the Capital just as Congress was debating their fate, and barring 200 kids from using vouchers next year.

It didn't make sense to me to put more students in the program,' explained Secretary Duncan.

But here's what really doesn't make sense: spending unprecedented billions to save a hopeless system, while letting real reform die. Unfortunately, such has been Obama's first 100 days.

Unfortunately, many people are likely to grab onto the little gains on the latest NAEP and declare gigantic, top-down reforms like the completely irrational No Child Left Behind Act a triumph. Were a notion like that to become accepted wisdom, it would turn this report into an utter disaster. For one thing, given all the factors that affect student achievement, it is impossible to give credit to any single reform. Much more importantly, if these scores suggest anything, it is that all our grand five and ten-year reform plans have been almost complete failures, like we've been buying more and more bushels of oranges for decades and getting just a thimbleful of extra juice. Quite simply, we've been lavishing huge amounts of money on a government monopoly inherently incapable of meaningful improvement. If we ever want better than that, we must completely change the structure of American education, leaving behind our Soviet-style system and replacing it with a vibrant market like we have for computers, grocery stores, courier services, and almost every other good and service we take for granted every day. We need universal school choice, and we need it now.

If the budget outline released by the U.S. Department of Education is what ends up getting passed, we can say goodbye forever to what little rationality remains in college pricing. The main constraint on college prices is the ability of students to pay, and while generous federal aid has enabled students to fork out a ton, prices have been somewhat constrained by Pell Grant amounts subject to the annual budget process and private – if federally subsidized – loans.

President Obama would get rid of even these mild constraints, ensuring that nothing stands between greedy colleges and every taxpayer dollar they can find.

If the budget outline released by the U.S. Department of Education is what ends up getting passed, we can say goodbye forever to what little rationality remains in college pricing. The main constraint on college prices is the ability of students to pay, and while generous federal aid has enabled students to fork out a ton, prices have been somewhat constrained by Pell Grant amounts subject to the annual budget process and private – if federally subsidized – loans. President Obama would get rid of even these mild constraints, ensuring that nothing stands between greedy colleges and every taxpayer dollar they can find.

What's the solution to this problem? School choice. Ensure that all children can access education, but let individual parents and autonomous schools determine what will be taught and how it will be done. Compel no one to support education they object and let everyone mark Darwin's birthday in peace.