A teacher friend recently told me that thanks to President Bush's No Child Left Behind mandate, by the time a child graduates from high school, he will have spent the equivalent of ONE ENTIRE SCHOOL YEAR taking tests. That equals a lot of school days when no real teaching was being done -- and no real learning taking place. I thought we were sending our kids to school so they could learn, not so they could validate the Bush administration's ill-conceived attempt to strengthen education.

It seems to me that No Child Left Behind needs to be left behind in the dustbin of failed Bush administration policies. I trust that Barack Obama agrees.