Key Issues in the Reauthorization of NCLB

As Congress moves toward reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act by the fall of 2007, a number of major questions cry out for discussion. Here are a few with special relevance for English and heritage language learners.

'Accountability' at What Price?

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 promised to "hold schools accountable" for the progress of underachieving groups – racial minorities, special education students, and English language learners – thereby forcing educators to pay more attention to these children. No one doubted that added "attention" would be forthcoming. The question was whether this version of "accountability" is would be beneficial or detrimental to kids.

Five years later, as Congress prepares to reauthorize NCLB, the verdict is in. Where ELLs are concerned, the law's impact has been precisely the opposite of what was promised. Research studies and reports from the classroom indicate that these students are not only being "left behind"; they are being further marginalized.

In particular, the high stakes attached to assessments – administered primarily in English – have had perverse effects that contradict everything we know about best practices for ELLs.

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What Kind of Accountability?

Should schools be held accountable? Of course. So should students, teachers, athletes, coaches, principals, custodians, bus drivers, district superintendents, school board members, state legislators, members of Congress, governors, presidents ...

But wait. Does this mean that schools should be:

  • Judged by student scores on a single test, even when that test is neither valid nor reliable?
  • Labeled failures if any of eight "subgroups," including ELLs, falls short of "adequate yearly progress," as determined by distant bureaucrats, or if less than 95% of the "subgroup" shows up on test day?
  • Forced to inform the community when they "fail" and invite parents to transfer their children elsewhere? ...
  • Face – in effect – the death penalty for repeated "failures": that is, restructuring to replace all staff, takeover by state officials, transformation into a charter school, or outsourcing to a private company?

NCLB proponents think so. This is what they mean by "holding schools accountable." Test and punish. Drill and kill. Crash and burn. It's what current law requires. Is this the only conceivable accountability system? Not at all.

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ELL Assessments: Neither 'Valid' nor 'Reliable'

Experts in assessment are virtually unanimous in opposing the use of standardized test scores alone to make "high stakes" decisions about students and schools. Even the test publishers themselves acknowledge that a single measurement, however valid and reliable, samples only a small part of what students have learned. It can never tell the whole story.

Now consider the state of the art in testing English language learners. Almost none of the assessments now available for these students has been proven valid or reliable in measuring their academic achievement.

Achievement tests for the vast majority of ELLs are the same tests given to all students. These assessments were designed for proficient English speakers, not for students whose English is limited to varying degrees. So ELLs' ability to understand test questions ranges from imperfect to nonexistent.

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Margaret, You're Doing a Heckuva Job

The Bush Administration's position on No Child Left Behind – not unlike its position on every other controversial policy it has pursued – can be summed up in three words. Stay the Course. A White House "fact sheet" on NCLB reauthorization puts it this way: "The No Child Left Behind Act Is A Historic Law – It Is Working, And It Is Here To Stay."

Head cheerleader Margaret Spellings (a.k.a. U.S. Secretary of Education) has called NCLB nearly perfect: "99.9 percent pure."

The White House says "we still have much work to do." That means it would like to extend NCLB testing mandates throughout high school and to create a private- and religious-school voucher program. But Administration officials recognize that neither of these proposals is likely to pass Congress. So its emphasis is on claiming vindication for the NCLB brand of accountability.

In a recent speech in Greensboro, NC, President Bush said he was "proud to report [that] the achievement gap between white kids and minority students is closing." Citing trends from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, he boasted that "in reading, nine-year-olds have made the largest gains in the past five years than at any point in the previous 28 years." In fact, most if not all of these gains occurred before NCLB took effect, as Stephen Krashen has shown.

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Can More Money 'Fix' NCLB?

Democrats' criticisms of NCLB have hammered hard on a single theme. To win broad bipartisan support for NCLB back in 2001, they say, the Bush Administration pledged significant increases in federal spending on public schools, but then it refused to deliver.

Over the past five years, the law has been "underfunded by $40 billion," according to the Democratic National Commitee. "As a result, 3.7 million disadvantaged children will go without promised help in reading and math." This statement is misleading, to put it politely. More important, it implies that NCLB would be working out just fine if only the Republicans would be more generous. While sounding "tough," this stance actually elevates political caution over a serious evaluation of the law and its impact.

Not to be outdone, Republicans have made even more deceptive claims about federal spending for schools. Since NCLB was enacted, they assert, the Bush Administration has raised school funding to "historic" levels. In fact, the federal government contributed less than 8% of total K-12 education costs in 2006 (a level that's about average for the last 30 years).

Funding is certainly a key issue for NCLB, with its ambitious achievement targets and extensive new requirements for testing, reporting, and supplemental services. The state of Connecticut has filed a lawsuit challenging the law's costly "unfunded mandates."

But to focus almost exclusively on funding, as Democratic leaders have done – and to make simplistic claims about what was "promised" – can divert attention from other key issues.

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Reading First: 'Science' or Politics?

The Bush Administration has been using the Reading First program to reward political cronies and ideological allies, ignoring a legal mandate to make funding decisions that reflect "scientifically based research," according to federal investigators. These and other findings are detailed in a report by the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Education, released on 22 September 2006.

As a result of favoritism and conflicts of interest, the IG found, states were pressured to approve materials from only a handful of preferred publishers. Virtually all others were excluded from participating in the Reading First program, which has provided $4.8 billion in grants to states and school districts since 2002.

The disclosures brought calls to hold Bush Administration appointees accountable for the alleged abuses. Rep. George Miller (D-Calif), the ranking Democrat on the House Education and Workforce Committee, charged that Reading First officials had "wasted taxpayer dollars on an inferior reading curriculum for kids that was developed by a company headed by a Bush friend and campaign contributor. Instead of putting children first, they chose to put their cronies first." Miller asked the Justice Department to initiate a criminal investigation.

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'Fine-Tuning' vs. Fundamental Change

Is No Child Left Behind a promising approach to accountability that merely needs a bit of fine-tuning to work better? Or is it fundamentally flawed and in need of replacement by a more equitable, rational, flexible, and constructive accountability system? Is NCLB "fixable" or does it need to be thoroughly overhauled? Should we "stay the course" or set an entirely new course?

These questions define the two basic positions on NCLB, as Congress prepares to extend – or overhaul – the law before it expires on 30 September 2007. The answers do not conform to a traditional liberal-conservative or Democrat-Republican divide. Instead they reflect broad alliances of NCLB enthusiasts and critics, respectively, each encompassing forces with widely varying interests and rationales.

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'Framing' the Debate over NCLB

The No Child Left Behind Act – though a policy failure in many ways – has nevertheless been a rhetorical triumph. For NCLB proponents, the emphasis on overcoming racial "achievement gaps" has served as a moral high horse, enabling them to gallop roughshod over critics while decrying "the soft bigotry of low expectations." Accusations of "making excuses for failing schools" and "believing that minority children can't learn" have proved to be effective weapons in the debate.

As a result, most organizations representing educators find themselves on the defensive whenever they raise concerns about NCLB's impact. Who wants to be labeled as "against accountability," much less "bigoted" against minority children? So those favoring fundamental changes in NCLB often find themselves at a tactical disadvantage in enounters with Stay the Course forces.

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What Does the Public Think about NCLB?

While supporting the stated goals of No Child Left Behind – in particular, the effort to bridge 'achievement gaps' – Americans are increasingly skeptical of the law's methods and assumptions, according to a Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup poll released on 22 August 2006.

  • Nearly six in 10 respondents believe that NCLB has either had no effect or has done actual harm to public schools; only 26% say the law is helping.
  • While NCLB holds schools alone "accountable" for achievement gaps between white and minority students, 77% of Americans blame societal factors, while only 19% cite the quality of schooling.
  • More than two-thirds of the public oppose the use of a single standardized test to measure "adequate yearly progress."

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