The fall semester hasn’t begun for most of the nation’s college students, but two newspapers yesterday graded the presidential candidates and Congress on their handling of education issues.

The Washington Post’s editorial page gave both major presidential hopefuls, Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, an I for incomplete on their education stances. The problem is that neither candidate has spent much time explaining their positions on education and what discussion there has been on education has broken down along predictable ideological lines, the paper laments.

The Christian Science Monitor editorial board gives a failing grade to Congress — already facing historically low approval ratings from voters — for not including stronger accountability measures in the recently signed reauthorization of the Higher Education Act (The Chronicle, August 8).

“Billions of taxpayer dollars are spent on these institutions or are given in student loans, and yet taxpayers know next to nothing about their return on this investment,” The Monitor’s editorial explains.

“This act does make an effort to improve the access and affordability of higher education but fails in delivering on the most important aspect: accountability for quality,” the paper concludes.