Lisa Caruso covers the politics of the NCLB reauthorization in this week's National Journal. The subtext of the article is who speaks for whom in the debate--and whose voice carries the most political clout. 

AFT Executive Vice President Toni Cortese argues that regardless of whether teacher unions are conveived of as a special interest group, "Congress should hear from teachers."  While Andy "Eduwonk" Rotherham may not disagree, he thinks teacher unions are "no different than any other lobby in Washington" and, at times, only represent the interests of their members, not those of children. My view, simplistic as it may sounds, is that what is good for teachers is good for children.

The National Journal piece is particularly intriguing in that it highlights the rift within the civil rights community over NCLB, one that, as Caruso observes, raises:

delicate questions about who speaks for minority chidren. The pro-testing groups, which are led by white activists, laid down their marker with a July 13 letter urging Miller and McKeon to resist weakening the law with additional, nonacademic measures.  In response, 23 other groups representing a coalition of ethnic and racial minorities fired off an August 7 letter calling for an array of assessments to chart students' progress.

La Ruth Gray, government relations liaison for the National Alliance of Black School Educators, praised her civil-rights colleagues on the other side of the testing debate for their advocacy for minorities. "But sometimes we have to speak for ourselves, " Gray said. "We recognize that a large number of young people are still behind.  We just don't want you to judge our kids by a single test."

Groups on both sides of the debate genuinely believe that they are speaking for children, so this issue could be one of the more contentious as reauthorization proceeds.