Law Students

Education Reform: Rep. Dennis Kucinich

By 3L at Seton Hall University School of Law and Editor-in-Chief of the Law Review.

Of the four Democratic candidates, Congressman Dennis Kucinich has the least persuasively presented plan for improving public education. It's unclear how talented and committed teachers will be recruited and retained. He's painted with broad strokes (at least on the campaign webpage) that prevents a more exacting analysis of his position on the issues.

He refers to his work in Congress to expand Head Start, and would broaden the class of eligible families to include those earning twice the federal poverty line. He also calls for universal pre-K for children aged three to five.

He emphasizes his strong and consistent opposition to school vouchers. Rep. Kucinich also calls for providing tuition-free higher education to students attending state universities. It?s not clear if all such students would receive the subsidy, or if there would be some qualification (it?s unclear to me why the federal government would need to subsidize a college degree for children of families who can afford the tuition). Noticeably, he is the only candidate who mentions encouraging art, music and creative writing in the classroom. Lastly, he calls for the recognizing higher education as allowable work activity for welfare recipients.

Full post as published by Urban Law Journal on January 23, 2008 (boomark / email).