Re: Finn & Hess: NCLB threatens education gains.

["Monty Neill" <monty@fairtest.org>]

Yes, Finn has not changed his underlying views. But he has now come out 
against some key NCLB structures that must be eliminted or radically 
overhauled for the sake of US education and our children. Thus, he (and his 
close allies) become "strange bedfellows," tactical allies.

Monty
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Erwin Morton" <erwin@morton.net>
To: <arn-l@interversity.org>
Cc: <ndsgroup@yahoogroups.com>; <ARN-state@yahoogroups.com>; "arn2-strategy" 
<arn2-strategy@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, October 12, 2007 10:50 AM
Subject: Re: [arn-l] Finn & Hess: NCLB threatens education gains.


> Hi, Monty --
>
> Chester Finn wrote this???
> > At its heart, today's NCLB amounts to a civil rights
> > manifesto dressed up as an accountability system.
> Have I had it backwards all this time?  I always thought
> NCLB was an "accountability" system dressed up as
> a civil rights manifesto.
>
> And perhaps I've been mishearing everything else
> Checker has been saying for the past however many
> years; or perhaps there's some serious "discovery
> learning", or at least an "Aha!" moment, going on here.
>
> But then there's this stuff about NCLB ...
> > threaten[ing] to undermine two decades of hard-won
> > gains on educational accountability
> Silly me.  I always thought the goal of education reform
> was supposed to be gains in student learning and
> understanding.  I guess that still doesn't matter, as
> long as we have measurement and accountability.
>
> It feels as if I've gone through the looking-glass -- or
> perhaps gone halfway through and gotten stuck in a
> twilight zone in the middle.
>
> Cheers --
>
> -- Erwin
>
>
>
>
> Monty Neill wrote:
> > Joel Packer of NEA forwarded this. It further opens what now might become 
> > an opportunity to go after the absurdity/insanity in NCLB, that by 
> > threatening educators and testing children, the kids will all score 
> > "proficient" in 2014. While multiple measures, multiple (local and 
> > performance) assessments and sanctions have been at least modestly 
> > (though inadequately) addressed in the House discussion draft on NCLB, 
> > 2014 and AYP have not. It is the entire interlocked structure that is 
> > causing the reduction of schooling to test prep in two subjects, with 
> > ironically an ensuing slowdown in score gains in reading and math on NAEP 
> > at grades 4 and 8. BTW, FairTest does not support Fordham's support for 
> > national tests, nor do we believe that state accountability systems have 
> > been a beneficial approach to school improvement - indeed, they have had 
> > many of the same damaging effects as NCLB. That is, NCLB is state systems 
> > on steroids. Monty
> > Just published in Checker's newsletter (Fordham Fdn) - NCLB continues to 
> > produce interesting bedfellows.
> >
> > From Checker's and Rick's Desks
> >
> > Leave no (none, zero, nada) child behind?
> >
> > Passed by Congress in late 2001 and signed by President George W. Bush 
> > one year after his inauguration, the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) is 
> > the most ambitious federal education statute ever.
> >
> > After five years of experience with a statute that aims to produce 
> > ''universal proficiency'' (in math and reading, mainly in grades 3-8) by 
> > 2014, and with reauthorization looming, it's time to draw some 
> > conclusions about how NCLB has unfolded on the ground--and how it ought 
> > to be changed.
> >
> > Much has been written about NCLB's particular testing regimen. Far less 
> > has been written about the law's remedies, whereby a Title I school that 
> > fails to make adequate yearly progress (AYP) is subject to a parade of 
> > stiffening interventions designed to change it and give new options to 
> > its students. Our new book pries into this facet of NCLB to examine these 
> > remedies and their effectiveness (you can read more about our findings 
> > here and here).
> >
> > But as Congress sets about reauthorizing the law, diving into its innards 
> > to tweak this and that, it will pay insufficient heed to NCLB's main 
> > problem, which is not concerned with tests or remedies but with 
> > philosophy.
> >
> > The law began with the noble yet naïve promise that every U.S. 
> > schoolchild will attain ''proficiency'' in reading and math by 2014. 
> > While there is no doubt that the number of ''proficient'' students can 
> > and should increase dramatically from today's 30-ish percent (using the 
> > National Assessment definition of proficiency), and while the achievement 
> > of children below the proficient level also can and should rise closer to 
> > proficiency, no educator in America believes that universal proficiency 
> > will, in fact, be attained by 2014, not, at least, by any reasonable 
> > definition of proficiency. Only politicians promise such things. The 
> > inevitable result is cynicism and frustration among educators and a 
> > ''compliance'' mentality among state and local officials. (See here, 
> > here, and here.)
> >
> > At its heart, today's NCLB amounts to a civil rights manifesto dressed up 
> > as an accountability system. This provides an untenable basis for serious 
> > reform, as if Congress declared that every last molecule of water or air 
> > pollution would vanish by 2014, or that all American cities would be 
> > crime-free by that date.
> >
> > There is evidence from states such as Florida and California that the act 
> > is causing them to restructure reasonably good schools, to confound their 
> > own pre-existing (and sometimes superior) accountability regimens, and to 
> > fracture coherent school improvement strategies. NCLB is also pushing 
> > states to move aggressively in too many schools at once, ensuring that 
> > capacity won't be up to the challenges at hand.
> >
> > Whatever the political value of promising to ''leave no child behind,'' 
> > the results thus far threaten to undermine two decades of hard-won gains 
> > on educational accountability. NCLB's dogmatic aspirations and 
> > cobbled-together design are producing a compliance-driven regimen that 
> > recreates the very pathologies it was intended to solve.
> >
> > It's time to relearn the lessons of the Great Society, when ambitious 
> > programs designed to promote justice and opportunity were undone by 
> > utopian formulations, unworkable implementation structures, and a 
> > stubborn unwillingness to acknowledge the limits of federal action in the 
> > American system. In the end, Washington is not well-positioned to effect 
> > radical change in a sphere that depends primarily on state and local 
> > action, or successfully to require states and districts to adopt measures 
> > whose efficacy hinges on gusto and creativity rather than compliance.
> >
> > No matter how finely the legislative craftsmen tune NCLB 2.0, powerful 
> > cultural and political forces will continue to impede school improvement. 
> > A sense of urgency and outsized aspirations is commendable, but there's a 
> > world of difference between determination and delusion. We have spent 
> > forty years since the LBJ era learning how hard school reform actually 
> > is. Yet too many otherwise serious people, such as the members of the 
> > Aspen-based NCLB Commission, sustain that pretense, indeed worsen it by 
> > suggesting that sixty-plus technocratic changes and considerably more 
> > federal control will cure what ails the law.
> >
> > Wrong. What Washington can do best, given the structure of the American 
> > federal system, is deploy its ''bully pulpit'' to change the political 
> > climate, set common standards, collect and disseminate data, cultivate 
> > research and technical expertise, nurture pioneering state efforts and 
> > cast a spotlight upon them, and promote a clear understanding of what 
> > constitutes unacceptable school performance. Given different machinery, 
> > Washington might be able to do more. Until that day comes, however, 
> > responsible governance demands that the feds do what they can do 
> > well--and not sacrifice hard-won gains in the service of sloganeering.
> >
> > This piece was adapted from No Remedy Left Behind: Lessons from a 
> > Half-decade of NCLB, recently published by the AEI press. This book will 
> > be discussed at a forum on October 16th (see here).
> >
> > by Frederick M. Hess and Chester E. Finn, Jr
> >
> >
> > Monty Neill, Ed.D.
> > Co-Executive Director
> > FairTest
> > 342 Broadway
> > Cambridge, MA 02139
> > 617-864-4810 x 101; fax 617-497-2224
> > monty@fairtest.org
> > http://www.fairtest.org
> > Donate: https://secure.entango.com/servlet/donate/MnrXjT8MQqk