Tomorrow’s Presidential Surrogate Education Debate

The Teachers’ College at Columbia University is hosting an education debate tomorrow between surrogates of the Obama and McCain campaigns. Here are three questions that I would love to see moderator David Hoff put to the participants:

1. Why do both candidates support NCLB given that 1) The already modest NAEP test score growth rate has been slower since the law passed, and 2) U.S. scores on the international PISA and PIRLS tests have stagnated or declined across grades and subjects since NCLB?
2. Why does the Obama Campaign tout Eisenhower’s National Defense Education Act as a model of federal education policymaking, given that test scores went down in the eight years following passage of that law (and didn’t return to pre‐​NDEA levels for decades)?
3. Does Senator McCain support national school choice programs, and if so, how does that gibe with a federal government of limited, enumerated powers (education not being among said powers)?