No Child Left Behind Takes The Failing Grade!
From 2002, the Federal government, through Action of Congress, enacted the controversial No Child Left Behind Act(NCLB) . This plan was intended to enhance the primary and secondary school student’s education, primarily in the fields of English as well as math. Although this is an admirable objective, the construct of the plan has failed to bring the sought after outcome. Many educators have laid the blame on the method laid out within the No Child Left Behind method. With its concentration squarely on English and math, students, teachers and administrators face a task which imposes punishments if the targets are not met.
These punishments use the form of rescinded Federal money, which makes a catch- 22 kind of condition. Even the funding which is appropriated has not been acquired by the states. This is normal exercise since the inception of No Child Left Behind. In 2002, approximately$ 4. 2 billion bucks which was appropriated never arrived at the states. In 2007, this funding gap grew to an amazing$ 14 billion dollars! To add to the economic woes of the school districts, states all over the united states were suffering budget shortfalls in revenues, due to the state of the general market.
This resulted in many states discovering it necessary to generate budget cuts in several sections, such as, you guessed it, schooling! Despite the fact that schools are required to administer standard tests in English and also math, the testing protocol of No Child Left Behind does not stretch to other courses. Some schools were forced to drop other subjects from their curriculums if they were to sustain the Federal money. This doesn’t seem like a healthy overhaul of our academic organization.
Filed under: John's Message