Fwd: [arn2-strategy] Another Excellent NCLB Editorial

[Susan Harman <susanharman@igc.org>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Bob Schaeffer <bobschaeffer@earthlink.net>
> Date: Sat Jul 26, 2008  7:19:03 PM US/Eastern
> To: ARN Main List <arn-l@interversity.org>,  arn2-strategy  
> <arn2-strategy@yahoogroups.com>
> Subject: [arn2-strategy] Another Excellent NCLB Editorial
> Reply-To: arn2-strategy@yahoogroups.com
>
> Fom coastal North Carolina
>
> IT'S TIME TO LEAVE "NO CHIILD" BEHIND
> Jacksonville (NC) Daily News Editorial
> July 26, 2008
>
> No Child Left Behind, the massive education program enacted by U.S.
> Congress in 2001, is one of those well-intended initiatives that has
> turned into a train wreck. It is time to admit that it simply doesn't  
> work.
>
> Onslow County Schools, like many other educational systems, have
> struggled with the stringent goals set by NCLB since its inception. In
> addition to what, on paper, appears an admirable objective - to improve
> the performance of the nation's public schools - NCLB has probably done
> less to foster actual learning and more to tie teachers' hands than any
> program before it.
>
> Once criticized for "teaching to the tests," educators have now been
> saddled with goals that are next to impossible to reach and draconian
> sanctions that are supposed to raise the quality of instruction.
> Instead, NCLB has sent many excellent teachers scrambling for the door.
>
> At a time when educators' salaries are losing ground along with the  
> rest
> of America, why would anyone want to enforce a provision that does
> little but drive good teachers from the profession? It makes no sense,
> but that is what is happening.
>
> The rural, lower-wealth counties and inner-city schools can barely keep
> enough teachers on staff to meet their needs, yet NCLB, which purports
> to raise the qualifications of those who teach, discourages the ones
> they do have, forcing many fine teachers to rethink their personal
> career objectives.
>
> Although NCLB is designed to raise the reading and writing levels of
> America's children and provide measurable means of testing those
> abilities, what it is really doing is forcing teachers to "teach to the
> test" with a whole new desperation. The Adequate Yearly Progress, or
> AYP, goals that schools are required to meet are often impossible,
> turning the process into a shell game played between school and program
> administrators.
>
> Recently, Onslow County's latest AYP report card revealed Onslow did  
> not
> do very well in its latest assessment. Overall, the number of schools
> meeting their AYP goals in the county declined.
>
> What does that mean in terms of students actually learning something
> useful? How do parents make any sense of these numbers? They are the
> forgotten component of the NCLB Act.
>
> In truth, the only provision of NCLB designed to benefit parents and
> students allows those at low-performing schools to move to other  
> schools
> in the district.
>
> No matter which candidate carries the day in November, it is hoped he
> will take seriously the business of teaching, limit Congress' input  
> into
> education and, finally, kick the NCLB Act to the curb.
>
> It's an expensive, complicated program that delivers little but red  
> tape
> and bureaucratic mumbo-jumbo, something the American people already  
> have
> in abundance.
>
>
> http://www.jdnews.com/opinion/nclb_58379___article.html/ 
> schools_teachers.html
>
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