Following heavy criticism of his cautious leadership style on Libya, on Friday President Obama gave remarks about the crisis surrounding Col. Muammar Qaddafi’s escalating violence against the Libyan people. Obama announced that the United States is preparing to take a more aggressive approach in the conflict, but also tried to assure that American military engagement would be limited and part of an international effort to protect civilians.

“Here is why this matters to us,” Obama said, giving his analysis of the situation if left unchecked. “Many thousands could die. A humanitarian crisis would ensue. The entire region could be destabilized, endangering many of our allies and partners. The calls of the Libyan people for help would go unanswered. The democratic values that we stand for would be overrun. Moreover, the words of the international community would be rendered hollow.”

Obama listed the intervention efforts taken thus far, including laying sanctions, enforcing an arms embargo against the Qaddafi regime, and Thursday's U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing a no-fly zone and other uses of force if the killings do not stop.

“Once more, Muammar Qadaffi has a choice,” the president said, underscoring the resolution’s clear demand for an immediate cease-fire, as well as establishing water, electricity and gas supplies back to all areas of the country. If Qaddafi does not comply, he continued, the United States, our British and French allies, and members of the Arab League, will take military action.

“I also want to be clear about what we will not be doing,” Obama said. “The United States is not going to deploy ground troops into Libya. And we are not going to use force to go beyond a well-defined goal – specifically, the protection of civilians in Libya.”

Libyan foreign minister Moussa Koussa has announced an immediate cease-fire, but it it hasn't stopped Qadaffi's soldiers from continuing its campaign against rebel forces, according to reports.

Although President Obama has support on military engagement from congressional Republicans (Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham) as well as Democrats (Senators John Kerry and Bob Menendez), lawmakers on both sides have also expressed reluctance about making Libya our problem. Questions remain about the extent of violence against innocent civilians, as opposed to fighting between armed rebels and Qaddafi loyalists, and how the interests of Americans are being served.

Republican Senator Dick Lugar explained his reservations at a Thursday Senate Foreign Relations committee hearing: “Given the costs of a no-fly zone, the risks that our involvement would escalate, the uncertain reception in the Arab street of any American intervention in an Arab country, the potential for civilian deaths, the unpredictability of the endgame in a civil war, the strains on our military, and other factors, I am doubtful that U.S. interests would be served by imposing a no-fly zone over Libya."

In his remarks on Friday, President Obama stressed that he made his decision carefully, particularly when our military is already stretched thin from wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. “But the United States of America will not stand idly in the face of actions that undermine global peace and security,” he insisted. “I have taken this decision with the confidence that action is necessary, and that we will not be acting alone. Our goal is focused, our cause is just, and our coalition is strong.”

No Child Left Behind, the Bush-era law mandating standardized testing as a measure of school success, is not working and needs to be reformed. This was the thrust of a speech by President Barack Obama, who repeated, "We have to fix No Child Left Behind" five times while speaking at a Virginia middle school on Monday.

"That's why I'm calling on Congress to send me an education reform bill I can sign into law before the next school year begins," he said to applause from the Kenmore Middle School gym, packed with teachers, students and parents.

The president argued that while the goals of NCLB -- higher standards, teacher accountability and closing the achievement gap -- are good ones, the policy, which imposes sanctions on schools that fall short of its set standards, is too rigid, underfunded and ineffective. He pointed out that, under the current system, 80 percent of U.S. schools are labeled as failing, including schools that are making remarkable progress.

"First we're going to have to fix how our schools are labeled and identified," Obama said, pushing for more individualized assessments rather than the one-size-fits-all bubble-test approach currently used. "Instead of measuring students based on whether they're above or below an arbitrary bar, we need to set better standards to make sure our students are meeting one clear goal -- they're graduating from college and ready for a career."

The president's newly released education reform blueprint (pdf) also zeroes in on the poorest schools in the country. He's called on states to identify their lowest-performing schools and take bold action to transform them -- including, for example, firing bad principals and teachers. On the other hand, Obama repeated his call for increased support for teachers, particularly in the form of better training, more classroom funding, and higher salaries. "We're going to have to start paying good [teachers] like the professionals that they are," he said.

President Obama's proposal for fixing NCLB  is a departure from his usual focus on his keystone Race to the Top grant program, in which states must compete for additional funding with plans to reform their education system. I spoke to John Jackson, president and CEO of the Schott Foundation for Public Education and an outspoken critic of Obama's educational policies, to get his take on the president's new strategy.

"I appreciate the fact that president is pushing legislators to reform No Child Left Behind because it is needed," he said. "But it has to be true, transformational reform. To the degree that the legislators reach some bipartisan consensus that equals just a tweak in the plan, I think we would have missed an important opportunity."

Jackson is skeptical that President Obama's actual policies hold up to the status quo-shattering ideas he espoused in his speech. "It's one thing to say that we need to do this, and it's another thing to align the resources so that the results can actually occur," he said. "The resources, even as they have flowed throughout this administration, have not always been aligned with the education goals that the president has outlined."

For example, Jackson cited Race to the Top grant money that has rewarded states for enacting policies that tie teacher evaluation to student performance -- an experimental idea, he says, with no evidence of creating more effective learning. Jackson is none too thrilled, then, that Obama's NCLB plan builds on Race to the Top, opening it up to school districts. He contends that instead of testing individual approaches, the president should tackle more comprehensive measures, such as equitable resources for all states.

"The true measure is what's laid out in his legislative agenda, and if you look at the blueprint, there's not a lot of discussion around equity there. Not a lot of discussion of the use of technology or how we approach English language-learner students," he said. "The speech was encouraging to hear, but it's very difficult to separate his speech from this official document that came from his administration."

The NCLB reform debate that the president is gearing up for will no doubt shift as it proceeds, but it will take a lot more than tinkering around the law's edges and expanding Race to the Top to have his desired effect. The question is: Will the final bill go much farther?