The New Republic

Remember the controversy
over Linda Darling-Hammond, Obama's campaign and transition adviser on
education? Well, she's back. Rumor has it that Darling-Hammond might be getting
the deputy secretary position at the Department of Education, which, as this graph
shows, wields great power. "That's the person that really runs the agency," one
education expert and reformer told me. It's a scenario that reformers, who favor
tough new approaches to changing education and see Darling-Hammond as a
traditionalist, had hoped wouldn't happen. "I guess we lost on this one," the
reformer told me.

Calls to several education policy
experts confirmed that word is circulating in the community that she might be
tapped as second-in-command under Arne Duncan. "She's made the rounds talking to people, doing the kinds of things you
do if you're expecting
to stay in Washington," said Mike Petrilli of the Fordham
Institute, a conservative education think tank in D.C. He noted that, if she's not about to get
the deputy gig, she could be getting another department position, perhaps one
focusing on teacher quality.

In my conversations with them,
education policy folks also said they've heard that Wendy Kopp, founder of
Teach for America, of which Darling-Hammond isn't
a big fan, turned down an administration job. Michael Johnston, an Obama
campaign adviser, TFA alum, and school principal who's working in the senior
staffing process for the education department, declined to comment on who's
getting which posts. "The team will be tremendous," he said in an e-mail, noting
that an announcement about senior staff could come any day
now.

Reformers are crossing their fingers
that Darling-Hammond won't be named the No. 2.

--Seyward Darby

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