I’m in the midst of a couple weeks in Tbilisi, Georgia, doing my best to lend a hand to the Georgian Ministry of Education. A crazed schedule, logistical challenges, and trying to concentrate on, you know, being helpful, make it a mite difficult to craft interesting or relevant commentary (though I can already hear some sharp-penned readers, like plthomas or Ben Foley, asking, “How would that be any different than what we’re used to?” Touché). Anyway, I’m going to hand over the blog for two weeks while I’m away. Happily, two keen-eyed observers of educational policy have kindly agreed to take the wheel in my stead.

First up, next week you’ll be checking out the musings and policy stylings of Drew University professor Patrick McGuinn. Pat is the acclaimed author of No Child Left Behind and the Transformation of Federal Education Policy, 1965-2005, a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, and a leading thinker on questions of federal education policy. The following week, Paul Manna, professor at William & Mary, author of the terrific School’s In: Federalism and the National Education Agenda as well as the forthcoming CQ Press book Collision Course: Federal Education Policy Meets State and Local Realities, and an expert on questions of state-federal relations and policy implementation, will be up.

Both Pat and Paul disagree with me on various questions big and small and they’ve free rein while they have the wheel, so I’m as curious as anyone to see what issues they tackle and where they’ll come down. I’m confident you’ll find both of them interesting and informative (though I do hope that they’re not so good that they put me to shame...). And I’ll look forward to rejoining you in a couple weeks.