Don’t dumb down NCLB Act
President Obama has directed Secretary Arne Duncan, of the U.S. Department of Education, to grant flexibility in achieving the 2014 deadline for meeting the standards required by No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) — the former Elementary and Secondary School Act.
Quoting from the first document cited below “While all states will be eligible for this regulatory flexibility, only states that agree to meet a high bar will receive the flexibility they need to improve education on the ground for students. States granted flexibility would be expected to maintain rigorous accountability, including for subgroups of students.”
There are so many cuts in funding for education that it seems impossible for schools to meet the NCLB standards by 2014. However, all schools will must offer the education that children need to compete for jobs in today’s international market. This is a very important indeed.
While we at Promise the Children abhor using NCLB testing scores as the sole measure of the performance of teachers and students, these scores are a measure of whether the school is performing adequately in preparing their students for college or career.
We hope that NCLB standards are not “dumbed down”, but that schools are held accountable for establishing clear goals for the improvement of the education that they are providing — with time lines. We hope that Arne Duncan extends the 2014 deadline where appropriate, but does not eliminate mandated improvement in our public schools.
http://www.ed.gov/blog/2011/08/top-5-questions-about-nclb-flexibility/
Don’t cut standards for No Child Left Behind – The Boston Globe/
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