April 10, 2015
The correlation between today’s shortcomings in federal education policy and efforts to reduce funding for people in poverty reveals that the country has moved too far away from Johnson’s original vision. Johnson framed the ESEA as a policy designed to divvy up financial resources so that local schools had the money they needed to educate students. The administration, along with the liberals in Congress, also spoke of the education policy as part of a broader package of reforms. All these pieces ideally comprised what Johnson dubbed a "Great Society," where the government would offer a holistic agenda of programs that could reinvigorate entire communities. As they saw it, education was connected to civil rights, urban development, anti-poverty initiatives, and more. Without providing government support for programs that reduced social inequality, they figured, true education reform would never work.