Getting Real About NCLB

[Ed Jones]

Publicly reviled, NCLB is a bold attempt to create paths out for students of the very worst of US schools.

NCLB, finally, looked at these worst of schools and said,
1) "Stop." Stop defending the status quo. Stop retaining bureaucrats who refuse to be part of the solution. Stop retaining staff who can no longer fight the fight. Stop pretending these schools will work for kids if the district just has a bigger budget. Stop pretending, in fact, that they are working.
2) Start. Start experimenting with different approaches. Start letting more of the country's people and resources in. Lets hear proposals from outside the standard educratic monolith, and, as states allow, give a few of them a chance to succeed. If a school is not performing, give parents the right to vote with their feet (NCLB choice).
Start giving students support outside schools (Supplemental Educational Services). Provide money for after school tutoring programs. Make parents aware that their school is not providing what is expected, and give them the options to get extra help, or to see that their school is realigned, or to pick up and take the child elsewhere.
Start proving empirically that High Poverty High Performance schools can and do exist.
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Doing this in a land of equality under the law means your classroom, too, is affected. Your state probably did not design the perfect testing mechanism. They probably ask your kids questions you think inane. In your state, they may well be inane.

Your district may find ways to game the system at other reporting mechanisms. Your state may find ways to game the testing systems. All of these are natural outcomes in a nation of 300 million individuals and 50 different legal/ethical/cultural traditions.

NCLB's strength and weakness is that it leaves both testing and remediation up to the states.

All of these questions were studied and reported on at the summit Fixing Failing Schools: Is the NCLB Toolkit Working? (video and audio available).

In the next 18 months, 5000 schools will come to be in NCLB Restructuring status. Is your school one of them?

So, what more do we need to know about how NCLB is supposed to work? What do we need to know about how your state can avoid being the poster child that wrecks the whole NCLB chance for these students of the worst of schools?

[Mike]

Hi Ed.... hope this finds you well.

Fairly new here but saw your group and thought i would say hi.

Stop." Stop defending the status quo. Stop retaining bureaucrats who refuse to be part of the solution. Stop retaining staff who can no longer fight the fight. Stop pretending these schools will work for kids if the district just has a bigger budget. Stop pretending, in fact, that they are working

Interesting statement. I certainly agree that public schools need to be transformed but have not seen on the ground too many people defending the status quo in their schools.

In the urban schools that i visit fairly regularly in nj i see many people working really hard under very difficult conditions.

NCLB.... is not well designed to transform schools.... it is designed based on principles that are factory based and way out of date.

What has happened is that the testocracy has been manipulated to reproduce and credentialize the already existing social hierarchy.

I have seen no evidence that this is the way to transform schools that are most in need.

Please... share your experiences....

Be well... mike