Margaret Spellings, the US Secretary of Education appeared last night on The Colbert Report to discuss No Child Left Behind (NCLB). If you don’t know much about this policy, take some time to read about it – its quite an issue in current education.
Of course, you can read about it on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act
If you want to read the department of ed’s description: http://www.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml
For Colbert: http://www.hulu.com/watch/27661/the-colbert-report-tue-jul-22-2008
There is tons of commentary out there on the web!
I will attempt to keep my opinion on this topic short and sweet – there is no way to address all of it. The ideals behind NCLB are great – accountability, standards, teaching all children. I think that the forced infusion of these ideas into the system continues to bring needed reform. However, the practice of NCLB and many results have been less than ideal. There are unfortunate outcomes – teaching to the test, disproportionate focus (money, time) on struggling students, sanctions and punishments for schools (instead of help), kids being encouraged to drop out, and more.
The concept of NCLB is truly an extreme ideal – everyone will be equal, not only in opportunity, but in performance. Some argue that turning the system capitalistic would breed quality, but I hesitate to recognize these two ends meeting. Proponents of this cite success in the private schools – but private schools turn people away who pull down scores, of course they look good – they leave lots of children behind! The public schools would look good, too, if they only taught and tested the top. Children are not sales to be made, and they enter a classroom with needs and talents that are unmeasurable with a test. Not that the test scores aren’t a useful indicator, revealing symptoms.
I am torn – understanding the principles of NCLB, but frustrated with the outcomes. I am lucky to work in a good school that has escaped much criticism. For now, I will happily jump through the hoops and work through the red tape. I won’t scream that I have the supported ed cluster and not the gifted cluster when the scores are posted on the wall and judged. I will look at where I need to improve, because I do believe that I can learn from the results, even if others use the information for purposes it doesn’t fit.
Anyway, you should read more about it!
