Masreya, thanks for the enlightenment. That was informative. Salam :O)

I agree with what was said by many in this posting. However, it is important to note though that NCLB does not necessarily belong to Bush and his administration. Bill Clinton basically put through all the facets of No Child Left Behind, except the demand for Adequate Yearly Progress. NCLB is basically Clinton's law with some additions.

Salams :)

Salam to all. President Bush is not a rational and intellectual person. It speaks for itself when Utah wants nothing to do with the act. The basis of relying soley on "high risks" testing is ridiculous; it conflicts with the science of educating. Cutting off funds because of subpar scores within a school will only worsen the situation in urban areas. He should understand that assessment is carried out through observation, through interaction, authentic learning tasks, and other means. President Bush is not looking at the big picture, and never will because he has a limited scope of understanding.

I don't have any grand solutions except to fight it legislatively and via communication to the public whenever you can. It is a disaster of a law that doesn't help kids, it hurts them.

The one good thing it did was start guaging the progress of English language learners. This group was once exempt from the state and national tests (that determine real estate property values) because it would bring the score of the school down. NCLB now looks at different aspects of the test including race... interestingly - even in most affluent schools, the black and Latino populations (within the affluent school) end up scoring lower - comparitively to their own class mates... it makes me wonder about the system of the school itself and how it uses racial profiling to determine what types of classes they would be taking....

another problem I have with NCLB are the standards... a survey is done to see what should be the standards, but the real decisions are left to the politicians - most of whom don't have any teaching experience what-so-ever....nor do they factor in things like the language of the test... The only reason why whites tend to score better on them is because the standards were chosen by politicians who are mostly white.... the actual test itself is rather skewed and does not factor in the nuances of language that a foriegner may not be aware of (though s/he may very have a level of native - American -Standard -English)....

Thank you omarkazmi and PezDispenser for your comments.

I do think NCLB has put pressure for teachers to "teach to the test" which is wrong. Its too bad time isnt provided for districts to develop good quality curriculum, that allows teachers to target many subjets and skills together instead of in isolation.

I also think that the Standards Movement is a good thing, as yes Omarkazmi...it did begin before NCLB. In NY State, we have been part of the standards movement for quite some time now. Next year will be the first year of the new Gr 3-8 state Math and ELA exams. As the math coordinator in my school district I am happy at the timeline the state has provided teachers. The math exam is given in March and so they told us specifically what skills will be tested in march and what we can teach later, after the test (those Post skills will be tested in the following grade). This HELPS teachers. We at least have some common ground and are not all fleetingly guessing at what skills will be tested.

At the same time, resources are a challenge. I teach in a very diverse district. We have a large Latino and African American population. The achievement gap is a constant struggle.

I would love to hear how you are dealing with closing the gap, as well as targeting NCLB's requirements at the same time.

I almost feel we need that longer school day/year and need to become FULL SERVICE institutions...focusing on raising the whole child.

NCLB has become more about teaching kids the test rather than skills that they will need to know and use in life... it cuts out the time spent to offer students in need of extra assistance and then blames the school for not doing their job because the resources/time/books/computers etc do not exist because the whole school is preparing for a test that has no bearing on anything except real estate numbers & schools being shut down