The hits just keep on coming for Reading First, one of President Bush's signature education programs. We reported last month that the program had selected the same contractor that was implementing the program to evaluate its effectiveness. This was on the heels of reports last fall that the Reading First program was using favoritism to steer program funds to certain reading programs over others. Then, at the end of February, the Government Accountability Office released a report criticizing the lack of written guidelines to govern implementation of the program for both government officials and outside contractors - a report Rep. George Miller (D-CA) and Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) were quick to comment on. Kennedy and Miller said the program had developed a "track record of bias and abuse," and that the implementation was "flawed and mismanaged." Miller followed up the press release with a hearing in April, where John Higgins, the Inspector General at the Department of Education testified to the same conflicts of interest and mismanagement previously reported. Among the findings of the Inspector General's report, they found the Department of Education: 1) appeared to inappropriately influence the use of certain programs and assessments; 2) failed to comply with statutory requirements and its own guidance; 3) obscured the requirements of the statute; and 4) created an environment that allowed real and perceived conflicts of interest. Then today, Kennedy released a report providing additional details about how individuals involved in running the program at outside contractors had deep financial ties to publishers of reading materials purchased by states under the program. Yikes! According to the Kennedy report, people overseeing the implementation of the program at outside contractors were getting kick-backs from certain publishing companies whose materials and programs were being officially recommended as the tools to use under the program. Sounds eerily like the same kind of situation that caused the recent student loan scandals. All this, of course, is unacceptable, and unfortunately has not been unusual during the Bush administration. Good thing we've returning to a robust system of oversight in Congress and that they are paying attention to important offices like the Inspectors General and GAO. We certainly won't get too far relying on the President's own personal evaluation system - the Program Assessment Rating Tool. Using the PART to review the Reading First program, the President found it to be "effective" and that it had "strong program design and good management practices." Yet another reason not to trust the PART process.