Jim (jazzmanjim) wrote, @ 2004-04-22 08:53:00

No Child Left Behind?
This article appeared in today's Washington Post dealing with one school's travails with the No Child Left Behind Act. Of course, the scope of the story broadens significantly (as stories like this probably should) but what struck me was the slant of the article.

Here are some excerpts (with my commentary below0




"WARREN TOWNSHIP, Ind. -- Raymond Park Middle School lost its two arts teachers last year. Home economics was eliminated, along with most foreign-language classes and some physical education classes. The overwhelming priority these days is getting students to grade level in reading and math."




This is the lead. The second paragraph goes on to note how, instead of those things, they have a computer guy who tracks the students' progress and a management guru who's cut the courses up into smaller chunks with a test after each chunk.

But that kind of misses the point. The obvious conclusion you are supposed to draw from this is that the school had to fire their arts teachers because they didn't have enough money to keep then and the new folks as well and that the new folks are only there because of the testing requirements of NCLB. We'll get back to the money issue in a moment. Let's go on.




"But the principal's enthusiasm for the Bush education reforms is tempered by the knowledge that her school, like many others, will probably never be able to meet the performance targets. Several characteristics of the student body have historically correlated with low test scores: Nearly one out of four Raymond Park students is in special education; 35 percent are African American; 54 percent are eligible for subsidized lunches, a common benchmark of poverty. Under No Child Left Behind, every subgroup is required to demonstrate "adequate yearly progress" until it reaches 100 percent proficiency."




Okay, so from reading this, I'm supposed to assume that because a child is poor or African American I should expect a lower educational performance from them? Are we really going to just go ahead and say that publicly in this country that the poor and/or black are incapable of learning to a minimum level? If we are, then we need to stop dancing around the issue, say it, and stop wasting our education dollars on them. Why expend the effort on someone who will "probably never meet the performance targets"? Isn't that just a teensy-weensy bit racist??

Special educations students are a different story, and I know that NCLB treats them differently, but doesn't let them off the hook. Thanks to this enterprising teacher, I know what they should be doing, though.




"'We will always fail,' said Melissa Gogel, a sixth-grade special-ed teacher, whose students include several nonreaders and several reading on a third- or fourth-grade level. 'The government is trying to put everybody in one melting pot and say that everybody has to pass the same test.' She says she is teaching her students demonstrative pronouns when she should be teaching them life skills."




Yeah, that's good. What the hell is a "life skill" and how are they more important that learning how to speak and write English? I would consider communicating in English to be, unless you lived in California, the essential life skill in the US. If you can't communicate effectively, not much else if going to help you. But it's nice for me to see that Ms. Gogel has surrendered her class to failure. Well done. I've had the chance to spend some real time around, and work with special needs children also and, though I'm far from a trained professional, I've seen them respond to teaching and encouragement. It's not easy by a long shot, but it's definitely possible.

Moving on...




"Budget cuts in many states have compounded the problem, forcing principals and superintendents to make tough decisions on how to focus their resources. Faced with a financial shortfall, other Indiana districts have cut extracurricular activities, from school newspapers to the swim team to cheerleading coaches."




Okay, now the picture is becoming clear to me. We can't educate the children because we're not getting enough money to do it. Our schools are having their budgets cut and having these new NCLB requirements thrown onto them. When you put it that way, the schools might have a pretty righteous beef (though not an excuse. We all have to do more with less sometimes. How did me manage to educate our children in small one-room schoolhouses heated by a woodstove??).

Except that's not the case. The inference you're supposed to be drawing here is that the first school up there in Warren Township was one of those which had it's budget cut. But they didn't. According to the latest minutes of their Board of Education the school district is receiving a 7 percent increase for the coming fiscal year and that they'll be increasing teaching staff. So there does seem to be money to hire teachers and the management folks they believe they need.

And the article devolves from there into pretty much the same "The government's micromanaging us", "we dont' have enough money", and "they only care about results".

I'm not necessarily a fan of NCLB but I certainly do believe that results do matter. The only way I can see to objectively measure whether or not children are learning is to test them. If that means that schools "teach to the test" then that is an issue for the parents to take up with the schools. But that's the one thing I didn't see in that article at all: parents taking an active role. I saw a couple or three parents griping about how their kid has to take a test or can't take an arts class this year but I didn't see that parent going to the school system and demanding an accounting for their tax money nor did I see anything about parents helping the schools ready their children for the coming tests.

So whose fault is it ultimately? Ours - those of us who sit back and let the schools do whatever they want and use whatever excuse they want to not educate our children fully. If you want your kids to learn, you have to be in it with both feet - no excuses. Parenting just doesn't take a day off, you know?