What CEOs Want from the Next President

James Goodnight

Founder and CEO
SAS, a Cary (N.C) software maker

After the economy, "education needs to be second" on the next president's agenda, Goodnight says. "Last week, I spoke to all the superintendants right here in the [Research] Triangle—115 school superintendents in the state of North Carolina. I said, 'do you realize if we could drop No Child Left Behind for just one year'—and I had to wait for the applause to go down because they were all applauding, the superintendents hate it—we could give the kids the tools they need in school, not just a test at the end of the grade.
Quite frankly our post secondary system, our university system, is one of the best in the world. But our K-12, we've got to find a way to graduate closer to 100% of our kids in high school...If we're going to keep No Child Left Behind we absolutely need growth models, where we can measure the growth of each child. In each class, it shows whether or not that child is growing at the rate they should, rather than did they pass the bar. The question is the ones that are excellent students, we want to make sure they stay excellent by making sure that the teacher is paying attention to them, not just the poorest or slowest performers."

Additional excerpts from James Goodnight

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