"The likelihood is there isn't a federal solution in the short term - I think that's gone."

Like others, she brushed off the possibility of a federal solution.

But no one is proposing a federal solution to what virtually everyone agrees is a local issue.

The problem is national in scope and begs for a federal solution.

The answer, however, is not to wait for a top-down federal solution or simply to spend more money without changes in teaching, learning and accountability.

And a large number of states will have systems in place before a federal solution can clear a committee.

The debate over a federal solution is just as heated.

But the rest of the nationalist-minded government does not appear to favour the federal solution that is the only possible answer.

Obviously, he said "the federal solution would be best" .

"I am convinced that over this Congress, we will have a meaningful federal solution."