No Child Left Behind Act

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, President George W. Bush's education reform bill, was signed into law on Jan. 8, 2002. The No Child Left Behind Act says that states will develop and apply challenging academic standards in reading and math. It will also set annual progress objectives to make sure that all groups of students reach proficiency within 12 years. And the act also says that children will be tested annually in grades 3 through 8, in reading and math to measure their progress. The test results will be made public in annual report cards on how schools and states are progressing toward their objectives.

States will have until the 2005-06 school year to develop and apply their tests. Once the tests are in place, schools will be required to show "adequate yearly progress" toward their statewide objectives. This means that they must demonstrate through their test scores that they are on track to reach 100 percent proficiency for all groups of students within 12 years. The schools that fall behind may tend to have school improvement, corrective action, or restructuring measures forced by the state.

The No Child Left Behind Act has many positive and negative aspects.

Many school teachers and community members are starting to challenge many of the features of the No Child Left Behind Act. Many people feel that the law was developed too quickly and that it was pushed through Congress. For many years, both Democrats and Republicans have supported the limited role of the federal government in education. Now after the passing of the No Child Left Behind Act, many schools feel like they have lost the local control they once had. Democrats and Republicans should challenge the No Child Left Behind Act. Even though the No Child Left Behind Act has good intentions to help children, there are many hazardous strategies involved. The No Child Left Behind Act may do more harm than good. The strategies in the No Child Left Behind Act do not contain research evidence to support the law. The No Child Left Behind Act guidelines that were published in December, 2002 by the United States Department of Education, insist that parents of students in poorly performing schools be allowed to transfer them to a different school, even if it causes overcrowding somewhere else.

The No Child Left Behind Act also has a very narrow focus on curriculum. The act focuses on just math and reading scores. This could have an undemocratic effect on a large generation of students