Education Department Casts Wide 'Outreach' Net

This article reports on the aggressive and sometimes creative steps the Education Department has taken, since President Bush came to town in 2001, to promote its agenda to the public, including its support for school choice options such as charter schools and for Mr. Bush's signature program, the No Child Left Behind Act. The department has spent millions of dollars on public communications over the last four years, including: such gimmicks as a Web mascot--an eagle named Pablo--to appeal to Latino children; an ad in a tourist map of Washington; and radio spots that ran on hiphop FM stations. The Education Department's efforts to reach out to the public have taken a number of routes, including some that strike advertising experts as a bit mystifying. In 2002, for example, the department ran ads featuring a grinning youngster at bat in each of three souvenir programs for Major League Baseball's American League and National League championship series and the World Series. Tourists visiting Washington were also targeted by the department in its No Child Left Behind blitz. In 2002, the department paid Flare Media, of Arlington, Virginia, several thousand dollars to run an ad promoting the federal law in a free map distributed by the Old Town Trolley, a popular tourist-bus system. The map, which highlights tourist sights, is stocked in hotels, visitors' centers, and airports.