Does Child Left Behind Leave Minority Kids Behind

Does "No Child Left Behind" Leave Minority Kids Behind?

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President George W. Bush only 3 days after taking office announced No Child Left Behind, his bipartisan education reform plan. Less than 1 year later the landmark No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) of 2001 was passed. The major areas in this plan according to the Executive summary by the Department of Education, are increased accountability for States, school districts, and schools; parents and students have greater choices especially those who attend low-performing schools; more flexibility in the use of Federal education money by States and local educational agencies; and a stronger emphasis on reading, especially for young children (Ed.gov).

Each State had to make sure that there was a statewide accountability system covering all public schools and students. The system must be based on challenging State standards in reading and mathematics; annual testing of student's grades 3-8 and annual statewide progress objectives that all groups of students reach proficiency by 2014. All assessment results and state progress objectives must be broken down by poverty, race, ethnicity, disability and limited English proficiency to make sure no group is left behind. If a school district or school failed to make yearly gains toward the goals they would be subject to improvement, corrective action, and restructuring to get them back on course to meet the State standards. Schools that meet or exceed the yearly progress goals or close achievement gaps are eligible for State Academic Achievement Awards (Ed.gov).

Families of students who attend schools identified for improvement, corrective action, or restructuring have the choice to attend a better public school within the district at district expense for transportation and must use 5% or its Title I funds for this purpose (Ed.gov).

Students attending schools that continue to be failing for at least 3 of the 4 preceding years, must be able to use Title I funds to obtain tutoring services from a public or private sector provider chosen by the students and their parents (Ed.gov)

Failing schools are given an incentive to improve. If after 5 years they still do not meet standards they run the risk of reconstitution under a restructuring plan (Ed.gov)

NCLB created the Early Reading First program that made 6-year awards to districts to support early language, literacy, and pre-reading development of preschool age children especially those from low-income families. The Reading First program is a 6-year grant to States that give the grants to local schools that screen and use diagnostic assessments to determine which students in grades K-3 are at risk of reading failure and provide professional development for K-3 teachers in the essential components of reading instruction. The purpose is to reduce the identification of children for special education services because of the lack of appropriate reading instruction in their early years (Ed.gov).

Does NCLB act leave minority children behind? I believe it does. According to Monty Neill, he feels that the law will have the opposite effect of its name, with the most damage being done to low-income and minority students (Neill, 2003).

NCLB will damage schools that have large numbers of low-income and minority students. In schools where children don't perform well, there will be pressure to eliminate or reduce the emphasis on non-tested subjects like history, science, languages and the arts; to cut "frills" like recess and to only teach the subjects to the form and content of the exams (Neill, 2003).

One consequence of poor test performance is grade retention. The practice of grade retention only reduces self-esteem and encourages dropping out. Schools also resort to pushing out low-scoring students to boost average scores (Neill, 2003).

The one thing this law does not address is the poverty that makes it so difficult for many children to learn at school. Housing, nutrition, and medical programs are being cut at both the state and federal levels. Combine this with the failure to adequately fund schools means that many children will be left behind (Neill, 2003).

The sanctions of the law for failing to make adequate yearly progress have some in the Civil Rights community saying it penalizes and stigmatizes struggling districts and schools without the resources needed to improve (Reid, 2005). The Civil Rights Project at Harvard concluded "that district's facing sanctions, such as student transfers, serve large numbers of poor and minority students" (Reid, 2005). "The report, which characterized the law as having a 'racially disproportionate impact', also contended that federally approved changes to some states' accountability standards are letting predominantly white suburban districts off the hook" (Reid, 2005).

"For large city school districts, especially those with high numbers of students who are poor, Latino, black or English-language learners, the odds of failing to meet the act's high-proficiency hurdles this year are pretty good. That's because the rules are stacked against the very low-achieving schools they are suppose to help" (Fuentes, 2005).

In the report from the Civil Rights Project, they found that districts in Illinois, Georgia, Virginia, California, New York, and Arizona "that failed to make 'adequate yearly progress' had high numbers of students who were black, Latino, low-income and/or English-language learners" (Fuentes, 2005).

"Researchers found the act's two key rules - identifying subgroups within student populations and setting a uniform proficiency goal make it easy for large minority districts to fail. Large urban districts are more