We at the Department of Education are going to provide technical assistance; I've committed $14 million to show states how they might meet this more sophisticated approach.

My understanding is that Kansas, Massachusetts, they've been more pioneers on the special education side.

Higher education is confronting challenges, like the economy is, about the need for a higher number of more adequately trained, more highly educated citizenry.

We want to obviously foster a relationship that we're a partner with states; that we all share the same goals of closing the achievement gap, just as the Congress does; and that we're practical and sophisticated enough to understand what they're talking about.

We know that if we're going to remain economically competitive in the world, and viable as a civic democracy, that we're going to have to get more people educated to higher levels.

In Connecticut, my understanding, although I haven't seen the actual litigation, is that they want to measure every other year and not provide annual assessment as is required in the statute.