Today the National Education Association, the nation's largest teachers union,
voted to lobby for reforming the No Child Left Behind Act.
While I have never understood the logic of NCLB, many teachers and Democrats initially supported it. Kerry in the elections rightly decried the 'bait and switch' the Repugs pulled by promising to fully fund the initiative if Democrats voted for it. Now it seems that after having to live with this absurd law for a few years, the teachers have had enough.
No Child Left Behind was the first of Bush's many terrible policies that people are now coming around to seeing as the disasters that they are (read: Iraq, Medicare Part: D, massive tax cuts for the wealthy, etc, etc). NCLB was passed with overwhelming bi-partisan support at the time. 384-45-4 in the
House and 87-10-3 in the
Senate. In both houses the vast majority of Dems voted 'aye'.
After several years under this new system, however, people are starting to see its flaws. And it's not just that there's not enough funding to make it work. There are fundemental flaws in the logic of this legislation.
First I cannot for the life of me understand the premise that if we threaten to cut a schools funding then that will make all of the poor students there magically better. For this idea to work one must start with the notion that the problem with our schools today is the teachers. If they would just 'teach better' then everyone would learn and all inner city schools would be solved of thier problems.
Then, when a school is identified as being in trouble through low test scores, what does the NCLB Act propose?
"Cut thier funding even more!"
Yeah, that'll help.
A friend of mine is a Special Education assistant at a public school here in Madison, WI. She tells me that the main reason that the school doesn't meet thier NCLB goals is that many students simply do not show up to school on the test days. What are the teachers supposed to do then? Call thier parents and yell at them for not making sure thier kids are in school? Thier hands are tied.
Third, NCLB forces teachers to teach to a standardized test. Creative, imaginative teachers (who probably do much better at holding thier student's interest) are forced to 'teach to the book'. The NEA said much of the same:
Union leaders say the basic intentions of No Child Left Behind -- quality schools and skilled teachers -- are good. But the government's "obsessive" focus on testing student skills and punishing failing schools undermines education, said Becky Pringle, a member of the NEA Executive Committee that drafted the new policy.
Lastly,(and most alarmingly IMHO) is the content of the tests themselves, which as Greg Palast has pointed out, is heavily skewed towards upper class suburban students. Such as this real question taken from a New York state practice test.
Most young tennis stars learn the game from coaches at private clubs. In this sentence, a club is probably a
F baseball bat
G tennis racquet
H tennis court
J country club
Now that the National Educators Association is coming out for reforming NCLB, it's time to hear some Democrats back them up!