Shikha Dalmia and Lisa Snell on Obama's Lopsided Education Policy
President Obama has repeatedly promised to use an "evidence-based approach" for social policy—and when it comes to education, he has been true to his word: He has systematically promoted programs such as universal pre-school with little evidence of success and panned ones such as school vouchers with lots.
In his recent State of the Union address, the president—not for the first time—hectored Congress to "make high-quality preschool available to every single child in America." "Study after study shows that the sooner a child begins learning, the better he or she does down the road," he insisted. Actually, write Shikha Dalmia and Lisa Snell, "study after study" has shown the exact opposite—that publicly funded preschool programs make no lasting difference in a child's life.