One Reason Why NCLB Stinks

This is one of the reasons why I think the No Child Left Behind act is bad policy:

The majority of Maryland's fourth-graders are either reading whizzes or they are stumbling miserably. It all depends on who is doing the testing.

If it's the federal government, only 32 percent of Maryland's fourth-graders are proficient at reading. But if state educators are accurate, 81 percent of fourth-graders have met a passing standard.

A renewed debate over testing erupted across the country after the release of a new round of national assessments in reading and math that showed enormous gaps between the national tests and the state tests required under the No Child Left Behind Act.

Some educators say states might be setting standards that are too low, in essence dumbing-down their tests to meet a federal requirement that says 100 percent of schoolchildren should be able to pass the exams by 2014.

Comments

[Temple3]

I don't think Maryland or any other state will have too much to worry about in 2014. There is enough money - and enough jobs on the line for this all to get worked out, without anyone being hurt except for children. I'm sure teachers and administrators will emerge unscathed - as will institutional budgets. Dumbing down tests happened before NCLB - and it will happen after NCLB. Teachers and administrators also will continue to cheat on tests and sign over huge contracts for text books that do nothing to educate children. NCLB, as bad as it is, unfortunately doesn't begin to melt any ice of this intractable problem. Thanks for the heads up though.

[brotherbrown]

I have also read that the "Texas Miracle," the basis for NCLB, has turned out to be something of a farce as well.

Face it, as long as there are 50 different education standards, testing results will be iffy. My baby bro is working on his dissertation in Mathematics Education at UCLA (finished his coursework and passed his comps.) He's told me that nations that excel in math education have a single, national standard for education. I seriously doubt the US will ever get to that.