Implications For Education? Moderate.

Others may have more and better ideas, but my initial reaction to the newfound Democratic control of the House is that it will affect the rhetoric and activity level on education issues more than concrete things like funding levels and new or revised laws.

They're not going to "gut" NCLB, I would guess, or dramatically increase funding, though of course some new or newly-empowered Dems will try --only to be held back by more moderate colleagues (and party officials who want things to remain "bad" to improve their chances of winning the White House in 2008).

The majority does give the Dems the power to conduct oversight hearings and subpoena folks, however, which could make things more interesting on the Reading First front. As we saw last night, corruption -- or the spectre of it -- plays well in campaigns. So the Dems might go after the Bush Education Department like it's gone after Homeland Security and Defense.