Not enough money.
That’s a big problem for the big goals of the No Child Left Behind legislation. The federal government passed the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001 to fight inequality in education. The law set a national goal of equal results and accountability, measured by yearly testing in reading and math.
The problem: Schools say the government has failed to provide the necessary funding to reach the new standards. Sharon Birnkrant, principal of the H.W. Smith Elementary School in Syracuse, says the funding shortfall makes it almost impossible for schools to provide the comprehensive help kids need to meet the testing requirements.
“There was some academic intervention service money that came along with it for the kids who needed extra help. But that’s been very limited. So you can buy tutoring after school but you can’t buy buses to take the kids to and from school.” [Sharon Birnkrant]
President Bush was a primary champion of the bill. He argued that it is a way to improve the quality of education for all students. States were required to develop a measure of adequate yearly progress in the tests for their districts and schools. States must increase academic performance each year, with the entire state reaching the law’s standards of proficiency by the 2013-14 school year. The law also sets testing goals by gender, race, and family income, to ensure that achievement gaps between these subgroups are narrowing.
William Duncombe is a professor of management at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School. He says the law has the right intentions.
“The idea of having subgroups, the intention was to make sure that the system focused on the students that have been neglected by most education systems.” [William Duncombe]
But regional staff director for the New York State United Teachers union Bernie Perry says the federal government failed to live up to its end of the bargain.
“The states had to buy into this thing. Money was promised by the federal government to the states to get programs that would cause an improvement in the graduations and learning in the schools. What happened was the money didn’t come and it fell on the backs on the states. And the states are strapped.” [Bernie Perry]
Presidential hopefuls in the 2008 election have offered a variety of plans to deal with the problems of No Child Left Behind. Senator and Democratic candidate Barack Obama has repeatedly slammed President Bush for failing to come through with sufficient funding for the states. Obama has pledged to increase the resources given to schools.
Duncombe, the management professot at SU, says educators first need a better understanding of what causes the achievement gap in education.
“The main explanatory variable for what differentiates performance across schools is the background of the kid. Not what the school did, but the background of the kid. So in essence by setting these absolute levels you’re punishing a school for servicing low-income kids.” [William Duncombe]
Duncombe says increased spending will only work if the government is willing to make a strong commitment to giving money to schools with disadvantaged students.
“You give that school adequate resources and you give it the resources that would be required to compensate for the disadvantaged background of its students. If you do that then you could hold the school accountable without punishing it.” [William Duncombe]
Senator Fred Thompson, a Republican presidential candidate, voted for the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001. Thompson now says that he regrets that vote and would like to see states get money with fewer strings attached. Instead of the federal testing mandate, Thompson says he would prefer a new program where the federal government provides block grants that states can use as they wish for education as long they set up what he calls objective testing programs.
But Gerald Mager, a Syracuse education professor, says there is a risk that such a program could undo No Child Left Behind’s major success: forcing schools to look at the academic progress of students in disadvantaged groups.
“I think No Child Left Behind has presented the challenge and the advantage of saying you have to look at all the kids, and the kids within subgroups. And make sure that you’re not failing to serve any one subgroup well.” [Gerald Mager]
To the teachers and school administrators on the ground, the task seems unfair and unmanageable. Schools are facing enormous pressure from the federal government to reach the satisfactory yearly progress. They say the government has failed to provide the resources it promised. Schools that under-perform can be taken over by the state, and teachers and principals can lose their jobs. And Principal Sharon Birnkrant says, even worse, the way schools view their students is changing.
“When a child walks through the door now, in the past you would say ‘Great. We have a new student, we’re thrilled.’ Now you immediately say ‘Uh-oh. What grade is it? Is this kid going to test? Is this child going to negatively impact one of our groups?’ Kids are looked at as liabilities rather than blessings.” [Sharon Birnkrant]
Congress will vote on reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act in July, 2008. For Democracywise, I’m Jordan Meddy.
(Jordan Meddy is a graduate student in broadcast journalism.)
Tracy Kracker contributed information for this story.
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