The federal No Child Left Behind Act (formerly the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965) is up for reauthorization. It was passed in 2002 for the purpose of ensuring that every child in America would be proficient in mathematics and reading by 2014. The cornerstones of NCLB are student testing and Adequate Yearly Progress reports.

While the legislation is commendable, it is causing the citizenry (particularly educators) to question its promise in reducing the achievement gap. Can the nation afford more NCLB-related activities in public schools? Is NCLB fulfilling the promise of its visionaries ... or is the act stumbling along a path heading to nowhere? It is believed that NCLB needs an overhaul.

The 2007 PDK/Gallup Poll reported that 68 percent of the public feels NCLB is making no difference or is actually hurting the nation's schools. Said British poet W.H. Auden (1907-1973): "There is a great deal of difference in believing something still, and believing it again." This certainly is the case regarding the NCLB Act.

Mike Russell wrote in the fall 2007 issue of Teachers of Color, "NCLB is $56 billion short of the funding needed to make it work. Further, NCLB puts so much emphasis on standardized testing that schools are forced to reduce a child's learning experience to test preparation. The result is that there are 50 states with 50 different sets of processes to measure student achievement." This is an act of wholesale misfeasance.

Policy makers and educators believe the United States will continue to face tough times in educational venues. Therefore, the reworking of NCLB must have better mixes and allocations of resources to fix real and imagined problems surrounding it. The nation has successfully faced tough times on educational fronts, and it will continue to do so.

A mandate is needed for involving parents in their children's education. The reworking of NCLB legislation must have variables to ensure that PreK-12 educational outcomes will eventually rival the industrialized nations. But the U.S. Congress nor the nation's president possesses the authority to insist that parents be intimately involved in the education of children. This is a major shortcoming that, short of a fiat, might pose a dilemma for NCLB.

The heavy lifting of U.S. education policy is carried out by children. This is an incongruent picture regarding a cultural revolution that is needed to revitalize U.S. public school education. Parents cheerlead for their children; however, their roles must be more concerted for advantageous choices and decisions on their behalf to emerge. This is certainly not requesting too much of them.

Bonafide improvements in elementary and secondary schooling are needed. NCLB was to do for education what other legislation had not done. Policy makers are aware what must be done for some improvements, i.e., reduction of poverty, better teacher salaries, focused intervention programs and family literacy activities. These improvements would support long-term objectives for NCLB. For now, educators, students and parents are being left farther behind ... with NCLB leading the way.

Reach T&D Columnist Howard D. Hill, Ph.D., via educationconsultant@sc.rr.com.

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