Senator Jospeh Lieberman's Rival: Ned Lamont

On Monday, July 3rd Senator Joseph Lieberman announced that he would collect signatures to ensure that even if he loses his primary election in Connecticut, he will be on the ballot in November, as what he calls an "Independent Democrat." This story caught significant national attention in both blogs (an article by RJ Eskow at the Huffington Post) and newspapers (an article in the New York Times). Senator Lieberman's move to the right and support for the Iraq war has put his position as the Democratic nominee for the Connecticut Senate seat in serious doubt. Given this story, I decided to investigate his opponent's, Ned Lamont's, views on education.

Ned Lamont's education platform states:

"The answer is neither more standardized tests nor vouchers. We need to support universal pre-school to give kids a head start and offer their parents the best chance at providing for the household. We need trained, talented, and motivated teachers. We also need to provide parents and communities the support they need to assure that children start their school day ready to learn. We need schools that don’t close at 3 p.m. but are open to meet the real needs of the community, including arts and sports, tutoring, health care, activities for parents and
families.

What our country spends in one year in Iraq could provide a year’s free tuition at the University of Connecticut for every college freshman-aged American and Head Start for every four-year-old. We need to refocus our resources and our
attention on the children and young people here.

In part becuase of Mr. Lamont's opposition to the voucher system and additional standardized testing, he has been endorsed by both the Connecticut Education Assoication and the Connecticut Federation of Teachers.

The Lamont campaign press secretary, Liz Dupont-Diehl, explained that the candidate is strongly against No Child Left Behing. According to her, "No Child Left Behind provides punishment but doesn't allow people to succeed." She argued that the federal government should give schools resources to succeed, not simply close schools. Though I recognize that many people accept this logic, No Child Left Behind does not simply mandate the closing of schools, instead it asks states to develop structures that will promote improvement. If after multiple years schools still fail to improve, the legislation calls for school closure.

When asked how schools should continue to change to keep up with the globalization of society, Dupont-Diehl said that schools should align their curriculum iwth real business needs, using technology for valid purposes and help students understand the global nature of the economy.

Dupont explained that Lamont's policies on education as with everything else still have to be further developed, as he is not yet in the Senate.

Senator Joseph Lieberman's office had not responded to a phone call at the time of publication.