It is no surprise then that 'No Child Left Behind', the sweeping education reform law passed in 2001, has caused widespread controversy. For those who are players at the federal and state policy levels, especially, it has added new tensions to an already complex political give-and-take. And for Eugene Hickok '72, United States deputy secretary of education, and Thomas Jackson '79, president of the Virginia Board of Education, the result has been an interesting series of balancing acts.

A former member of the Virginia House of Delegates and a Carroll County attorney, Thomas Jackson has led a life saturated by education. His father joined the Wythe County School Board when Jackson was six, serving the last ten years of his fourteen-year tenure as chairman. Within the General Assembly, Jackson sat on the education committee and established a firm reputation as the education expert, especially well-know for his advocacy of rural schools. "There are so many issues being discussed in the House, I thought I could be most effective by choosing one and learning as much as I could about it," says Jackson, whose wife Cynthia is a former music teacher. "So I picked one that I was passionate about. "Inspired by "a sincere belief in the potential of people," which he says his father instilled in him growing up, Jackson ended his tenure as a delegate in 2002 and was named to the nine-member board of education shortly thereafter. Last summer, Governor Warner appointed him to a two-year term as the board's president. Bearing a constitutional responsibility to oversee every aspect of public education in the Commonwealth, Jackson's role as a policy maker is very much hands-on, dealing with everything from bus regulations to budget allocations.

Like his counterparts at the federal level, though, Jackson is driven by what he calls a "laser-like focus on promoting achievement" and feels that this is best achieved by standards of accountability. The problem arises when one starts defining which standards of accountability are to be invoked. Virginia, says Jackson, already has one of the best and most effective educational accountability systems in the country. So he asserts that the commonwealth has no need for 'No Child Left Behind' Act, and in fact would most likely take a step backward if it is implemented. The blueprint for 'No Child Left Behind' was announced just days after the inauguration of President George Bush, who hailed the initiative as "the cornerstone of my administration." Three months later he appointed Gene Hickok to the post of Under Secretary of education. Over the course of the next year, Hickok labored behind the scenes with members of the House and Senate to work out the details of the bill. He also helped to garner enough bipartisan support to secure its passage.

This year Bush announced Hickok's ascendancy to the position of Deputy Secretary of Education. As chief policy advisor to Secretary Rod Paige, Hickok works with various senior members of government and heads up a number of initiatives. But not surprisingly, the implementation of 'No Child Left Behind'-which is founded on four fundamental principles, namely accountability, flexibility, choice, and doing what works-maintains center stage in his efforts. Unlike most in Washington's "education community," Hickok is an academic. He was in his fifteenth year as a law professor at Dickenson School of Law and as a political science professor at Dickenson College, where he also directed their Clarke Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Contemporary Issues, when Tom Ridge, the newly elected governor of Pennsylvania, contacted him. Only a few days after meeting with Ridge and hearing his ambitious plans for education reform-which were not unlike those of Hickok's current boss-the governor called and asked if he were willing "to get into a foxhole" with him.

The Honorable Thomas M. Jackson, Jr. '79, an attorney, president of the Virginia Board of Education, and a defender of Virginia's successful Standards of Learning.

Just two days later Hickok began what would become the longest tenure of any secretary of education in Pennsylvania. And over the course of that following six years he gained national attention for his efforts in implementing Ridge's reform agenda. He testified before the U.S. Congress about the success of those initiatives. An unknown face in the world of educational politics, Hickok sparked curiosity among the state's rank-and-file policy makers when he assumed the position. But he says his relative inexperience was a boon, despite the headaches of a greater learning curve. "Because I was an academic, I couldn't be pigeonholed politically," he says. "And because I really needed to learn the way things worked, I asked questions that no one had asked for a long time."

Likewise, he says the state level perspective has afforded him important insights at the federal level. Of the upward of $480 billion dollars a year spent on education in America, 8% comes from the federal level; it often comes with regulations and directives attached which can conflict with local ideas about the educational process.And while he enjoys the intensity of his current position, he says he misses the actual proximity to education. "I'm much further away from the process now," he notes. "At the state level, where I dealt with budget and policy, " says Hickok, "I could feel the relationship between what I did and what took place in classrooms. Now, because D.C. is removed from that and because most decisions are made at the state level, my primary customers are state actors."

In Virginia, one of those actors is Thomas Jackson, whose advocacy of Virginia's Standards of Learning program seems to resonate with the mandate for state accountability testing so central to 'No Child Left Behind'.But despite the ostensible commonalities, Jackson and Hickok have spent the last year on opposite ends of a heated public volley between Virginia officials, who have drafted several proposals requesting specific adjustments and exemptions in regard to 'No Child Left Behind.' The U.S. Department of Education has firmly rejected each one. The education department has also rejected a resolution passed in the General Assembly asking Congress to exempt Virginia altogether because it already established its own successful accountability program.Tensions between state and federal educational policy makers have obviously tightened since the passage of 'No Child Left Behind.' But Hickok, who points out that the levels of clamor and the rates of compliance have grown in equal proportions, says this effect is not necessarily negative. "There's a lot of anxiety out there. This is a complex law. It requires a lot of change. Of course there's lots of complaining," he says. "That's exactly what you should hear from good men and woman who care about the public interest and who are trying to institute change."

This is certainly true of Hickok and Jackson, both of whom are driven by their common belief in the value of education. They also share an acute awareness of a changing culture of education in America. "Fifty years ago," Hickok says, "Brown v. Board of Education changed everything. Zoom forward fifty years. We still have achievement gaps, which in this country is unacceptable. My hope is that fifty years from now we'll look back and see 'No Child Left Behind' as the next logical step. If Brown was about access, this is about success. We are talking about educating the next generation of America, and that's a generation which will have tremendous responsibilities. If this is a nation that can put a probe on Mars and can talk about putting a man on Mars, it's certainly a nation that can make sure its children can read. I really feel 'No Child Left Behind' is helping public education better reflect the challenges of the twenty-first century. And I'm excited to be part of that process."

Eugene W. Hickok, Jr. '72, Deputy Secretary of Education in the Federal Government and one of the chief proponents of the 'No Child Left Behind' act.

"Two decades ago," Jackson explains, "the teacher taught to the whole group and everyone moved on purely for social promotion. Last year was the first year students [in Virginia] really had to meet meaningful requirements to move on. The process is becoming much more individual and intentional." The agent of that change, he says, is accessible data. "When I was a delegate, we based policy on assumptions and anecdotal evidence. We were completely reactive. Now we have the information to show us how certain programs affect student achievement, and we better know what causes the illness of poor performance. It's an important step towards becoming proactive."

"I base my philosophy of education on the belief that every child can learn," Jackson continues. "The issue is resources and time, not capability, which is why access to data is such a monumental thing at the policy level. Public education is better now than ever. And I'm equally confident that the best is yet to come."A leadership profile on Hickok in the Summer 2004 issue of The Business of Government, published by the IBM Center for The Business of Government, states, "Over the past three years, the act ['No Child Left Behind'] has changed the way Americans think about education. While it is early to see dramatic changes in test scores, or troubled schools turned around, there is evidence that scores are improving and schools are moving in the right direction. What is also encouraging to Hickok is the fact that the conversation about education has changed: 'Everywhere-and I read newspapers all the time, the newspapers that cover school board meetings-the conversation is all about performance, accountability, test scores, curriculum, highly qualified teachers. It's the kind of thing that wasn't part of the commentary just a few years ago.' "'No Child Left Behind' has already become a major issue in the 2004 presidential election. We can expect education to be an issue in the Virginia gubernatorial election in 2005. Jackson and Hickok, like many "good men and good citizens" in the electorate, may disagree on the means to improve public education-'No Child Left Behind' or SOLs-but they share a common commitment to the value of learning to the individual and to society, a commitment that both assert is rooted in their Hampden-Sydney education. Eugene W. Hickok, Jr. '72,Deputy Secretary of Education in the Federal Government and one of the chief proponents of the 'No Child Left Behind' act.