Short of the top

Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett and the leadership of the Indiana State Teachers Association are making Washington Democrats and Republicans look like dope-smoking old hippies singing kumbaya around the campfire:

Indiana will bow out of the federal Race to the Top competition after a highly public feud between public schools chief Tony Bennett and the state's teachers' unions.

[. . .]

Bennett said his decision came after the president of the state's largest teachers' union, the Indiana State Teachers Association, declined to meet with him in an April 27 meeting in his office. Bennett also had invited the news media to attend.

“ISTA is more than willing to meet with you and your staff in meaningful work sessions, but we will not participate in a media event arranged for the purpose of strong-arming ISTA into agreeing to an unequivocal sign-off regarding the Indiana Department of Education's Race to the Top application demands,” ISTA President Nate Schnellenberger wrote in a letter released by Bennett.

Hard not to have mixed feelings about this. The teachers' unions look out for their members, even when it isn't in the best interests of students, which is frequently. But Race to the Top is just an extension of No Child Left Behind, and Indiana's non-participation in the further nationalizing of education is to be welcomed. Let the school systems that have extensive reform plans (such as Fort Wayne Community Schools) proceed on their own so local parents and taxpayers can judge their efforts. Let the state get on with charter schools and trying to tie student performance to teacher evaluations. Let the feds give the money to some other state, along with the attendant rules and regulations and bureaucratic fussbudget