The day after his 18th birthday, Jackson Fuhrman will go to the polls and cast his first vote for president.
The Brighton High School senior is especially eager to vote after his teacher, Aaron Hadfield, taught students about totalitarian societies by creating one in his classroom for two weeks, complete with flags, fake torches and costumes.
"It takes away everything, all the basic rights Americans take for granted," Fuhrman said. "It definitely makes you want to vote."
Fuhrman said one thing he would like the next president to focus on is providing more funding for schools so teachers can teach more lessons like Hadfield's. Fuhrman might be one of the few Utahns who will head to the polls Nov. 4 with schools in mind. Given the state of the economy, health care and the war in Iraq, education won't likely be the heaviest issue weighing on most Utahns.
"There's just too many other crazy things like the economy, economy, economy," said Boni Ferree, a mother of two students at Clayton Middle School in Salt Lake City. Whoever becomes president next, however, will undoubtedly face decisions that will affect the daily lives of Utah children.
For example, what should happen to the federal education law No Child Left Behind (NCLB)? Should the federal government expand school choice programs? Should federal preschool programs be expanded? What should be done to help more students afford college?
Many are watching the election closely.
"What I'm trying to do is get [students] to want to turn the TV on and think about what's going on in our society," Hadfield said. "I think this is probably the most intense and significant election of my lifetime."
Candidates' plans
Though neither presidential candidate has spent much time talking about education, they each have plans.
Obama wants to increase funding for and improve Head Start, a federal preschool program for low-income families, and McCain wants to improve it while working with existing programs. Last year, Utah Head Start programs served more than 5,500 children.
Betsy Thurgood, who teaches kindergarten at West Point Elementary School in the Davis School District, said she can tell the difference between children who attend preschool or work with parents at home before entering her classroom versus those who have little or no preparation.
"Early childhood education is so valuable," Thurgood said. "In the competitive world today we need to make sure our students are learning at the optimal time."
Both candidates also have plans that address, to different degrees, college access and affordability.
William Sederburg, Utah commissioner of higher education, said he's frustrated with a 25-year national trend of declining public investment in colleges and universities. He said educated people are more likely to vote, volunteer and contribute money to civic causes.
"For the whole society to move ahead we need a renewed commitment to higher education," Sederburg said.
No Child Left Behind
In terms of education this election, however, the elephant in the room is NCLB.
The Bush administration initiative is often misunderstood, and, at best, controversial. The name NCLB is mud among many Utah education leaders.
"People in Utah are capable of taking care of their own issues, their own families, as are people in every state," said state Sen. Margaret Dayton, R-Orem, who has long fought to eliminate the law.
State Schools Superintendent Patti Harrington would also like to see the law disappear and state control restored.
But Utah parents and teachers are more ambivalent. Some see NCLB as a burden on schools and students while others believe it has helped target those who most need help.
NCLB requires schools to test students each year to measure their progress toward the law's ultimate goal - that all students read and do math on grade level by 2014. Schools that accept federal money for serving low-income areas but fail to meet the yearly progress goals face sanctions. The idea is to make sure schools pay attention to all groups of students, including minority, special education and low-income students.
East Midvale Elementary School sixth-grade teacher Richard Mellor said NCLB has pros and cons, but it can sometimes help schools such as his. East Midvale didn't meet the goals of NCLB and now faces sanctions.
"It's not a big threatening thing where people come in and punish us," Mellor said. "People go more out of their way to make sure more resources are available to us."
Others, however, such as East Midvale teacher Brenda Williams, said the consequences of failing to meet testing goals can be difficult to take.
"The teachers who work in Title 1 schools work so hard, and it's really hard to be looked at as a failing school and failing teacher," Williams said.
She said sanctions scare some teachers away from such schools. She said she would like to see the next president offer incentives to attract more good teachers to schools that need them.
Both McCain and Obama want to offer such incentives. Neither candidate, however, wants to scrap NCLB.