NCLB: Bad for Kids, Good for Bureaucrats

[Bob Schaeffer <bobschaeffer@earthlink.net>]

NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND GOOD FOR BUREAUCRATS, BAD FOR KIDS
Nevada Commercial Appeal Column -- August 13, 2006
by Robert L. Cutts

It's been interesting to read the first rush of statistics distributed 
to the media recently on how much progress some of Nevada's public 
schools report this past academic year under the federal No Child Left 
Behind program.

NCLB, you'll recall, holds every school accountable for whether the 
number of its students scoring pre-set grades of proficiency in math and 
reading on state tests has met U.S. government standards. The program 
has raised great smoke in the land, but its principle promise is that 
all schools in the country must and will report 100 percent proficiency 
among all students by the year 2014.

Or there will be bureaucratic hell to pay.

Most of us recall long evenings and weekends of our own back in school, 
"cramming" for exams to get those passing grades. But having done some 
teaching myself, I'm more interested to think about how the educators 
will get NCLB to work.

I lived in Japan for a while, that wonderland of educational systems, 
where Americans marveled at the top scores and the astonishing 
efficiency of schools that seemed to graduate everyone, successfully, 
into a professional place - nationwide! The secret, many held, was 
simple. On any day, theoretically throughout the country, every student 
in every grade in every classroom was studying the exact same topic, 
likely from the same textbook, as everyone else in that grade. Everybody 
got the same instruction, therefore equality, therefore the same chance 
to succeed.

That 'secret' underlies NCLB's own real misdirection: every Japanese 
student was being prepared in class to answer the same questions on the 
same tests! The teachers worried little about the principles of liberal 
or any other kind of education, as we Americans do. They only had to 
teach the students what sort of questions would be put to them, and what 
answers to give. Those who had the best memories came out on top.

Quaintly, it was known to students and families throughout the country 
as "Exam Hell."

American parents and educators alike by now face the deeper questions 
such an approach raises, including this one: why have a federal testing 
standard for everyone, when as Congressional researchers themselves 
point out: "each state determines its own academic standards, the 
courses taught, the standardized tests used and the cutoff scores that 
define a student as proficient." Doesn't that mean "pass" in Arizona 
could equal "fail" in Minnesota? Couldn't the collected, holistic 
judgments of Arizona and Minnesota teachers be a better metric?

No one knows, because as the same government research pointed out last 
year, "State education departments are often overwhelmed. Many don't 
have the staff or the expertise to effectively carry out NCLB's 
requirements ... and the alarm has been sounded not only by the states 
but also by private researchers and even the Government Accountability 
Office."

The government itself isn't sure this can be done Ð but it's already 
tabulating the results and holding schools to account.

But there's a much, much bigger question: why is Washington, which funds 
only a part of the NCLB effort, even in the classroom at this level - 
handing out mandates to states, and telling districts how to measure 
their results? Education is, to any American community, many things. 
It's an integral part of the social fabric not just of the community, 
but of its families. It imbues the young not only with facts and 
capabilities, and visions of tomorrow's opportunities, but with the 
importance of independent thinking and the urgency of citizens' 
responsibilities.

Now it's been turned into a federal program, the same as FEMA or 
Homeland Security. NCLB charts are up on the walls of federal officials, 
whose career prospects depend on how much progress they show; government 
accountants and budgeters are scoring the academic results from all the 
states and school systems of the union.

Now we all hope to see children motivated, absorbed, learning, building 
their futures, doing well in school. Some need more or different help 
than others. They always will; they're just not the same as one another. 
Is this involuntary nationalization the route we choose as the best to 
achieve all such things?

As has been much remarked, but needs to be remembered, all that the 
schools and teachers are really sure of now is, first, their skills of 
how to motivate, absorb and teach students things like art, music, 
civics, world history and advance-placement classes. Those are secondary 
to the program's spreadsheet goals.

And second, if they want to keep their schools and their jobs, throw all 
or much of that stuff in the back seat and prioritize teaching to the test.

Just move the kids on, no matter how deceptive the statistical results 
turn out, no matter what they're getting from school. We have to 
remember that a test that every single person who takes it can pass 
isn't a real test, and proves nothing about the quality of the education 
and the life chances he or she is really accruing.

Not only that but the target and the arrow are fast approaching each 
other: 100 percent success rate, everywhere, by 2014. Even in a 
pass-fail system, that's something that is going to prove not possible. 
What will the schools (or states) feel themselves compelled to do to the 
testing process to wring out those last few impossible percentiles? And 
what will that wring out of every other student?

Never mind: just find a way, through test or testing, to hand out the 
sheepskin: the numbers will somehow be made to prove that Washington was 
right.

- Robert L. Cutts is a career journalist, and the author of "An Empire 
of Schools: Japan's Universities and the Molding of a National Power Elite."

   http://www.nevadaappeal.com/article/20060813/OPINION/108130073