Political Action in Public Education

Within the history of the United States, education policy has been an area of constant development and change. The unique structure of government in the U.S. means that any changes on a national level go through a detailed process with many different actors coming together and working toward the change. In the case of education policy change is often an intensive and laborious process. When looking at these changes the question really is this: does change in education policy represent government reacting to its own failures? Investigation into this question is divided into 6 sections: 1 – an introduction, 2 – history of U.S. education policy, 3 – analysis of scholarly views on education policy and the political nature of education, 4 – actions and the perspective of interest groups 5 – a case study using Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015. The final chapter is 6 – a conclusion designed to bring seemingly separate sections together. These pieces come together to demonstrate that when looking at education policy, political action and decision making is indeed reactionary, often looking to rectify past missteps to ensure of brighter future.