The federal No Child Left Behind act is based on the Texas version, so Rice University (w00t! go Owls!) studied the “success” of the Texas program. Extrapolate what you will. Here are a few excerpts (Of course, you might as well read the whole thing, as much as I have excerpted):
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“No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), directly contributes to lower graduation rates.”
“60 percent of African-American students, 75 percent of Latino students and 80 percent of ESL students did not graduate within five years.”
“The study shows as schools came under the accountability system, which uses student test scores to rate schools and reward or discipline principals, massive numbers of students left the school system. The exit of low-achieving students created the appearance of rising test scores and of a narrowing of the achievement gap between white and minority students, thus increasing the schools’ ratings.”
“The higher the stakes and the longer such an accountability system governs schools, the more school personnel view students not as children to educate but as potential liabilities or assets for their school’s performance indicators, their own careers or their school’s funding.”
“The study shows a strong relationship between the increasing number of dropouts and school’s rising accountability ratings.”
“The discrepancy between the official dropout rates, in the 2 to 3 percent range, and the actual rates can be attributed to the state’s method of counting, which does not include students who drop out of school for reasons such as pregnancy or incarceration or declare intent to take the GED sometime in the future.”
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Wow. Kind of speaks for itself. Taking this to absurd conclusions, the goal of NCLB might as well be “one high-performing white kid per school with the rest of the ’students’ at home prepping for the GED.”
(Recently, the White House agreed to lessen some of the punitive measures of NCLB. Who knows to what end.)
