Resources for No Child Left Behind

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The No Child Left Behind Act places greater demands on states and school districts than ever before. States must define the level of proficiency that all students are expected to reach and bring all their students up to this level by school year 2013-14. States must also expand their testing programs, analyze and design new ways to report test results, provide technical assistance to under-performing districts and schools, and improve teacher preparation. School districts must raise test scores in reading, math, and science, close achievement gaps, design improvement strategies and interventions for under-performing schools. These resources offer a guide for parents, teachers and administrators who must both understand and implement No Child Left Behind effectively to increase student achievement.

Education Department Offers Desktop Reference for No Child Left Behind
The U.S. Department of Education has created a 180 page desktop reference manual to No Child Left Behind. The guide offers a program-by-program look at the major reforms under the law. For each section of the landmark law, the manual explains the purpose of the program, what's new in the law, how the program works, key requirements, how to achieve quality, how performance is measured and key activities and responsibilities for state education departments.

Copies of the publication are available free of charge by calling 1-877-4ED-PUBS or online at http://www.ed.gov/pubs/edpubs.html. The report can also be accessed through ED's web site at http://www.ed.gov/offices/OESE/reference.html.

Using NCLB To Improve Student Achievement
The Public Education Network recently issued "USING NCLB TO IMPROVE STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT: An Action Guide for Community and Parent Leaders." This action guide by the Public Education Network cuts through education jargon and explains the law's new requirements for states, districts, and schools in clear terms. It is organized as an easy-to-use professional development tool for administrators and teachers and prioritizes 10 major areas in the law where the public should concentrate its action
http://www.publiceducation.org/download/NCLBBook.pdf

Leave No Child and No Family Behind
This website from the National Network of Partnership Schools (NNPS) at Johns Hopkins University, directed by Dr. Joyce L. Epstein, assists schools, districts, and state departments of education in meeting and exceeding requirements of the No Child Left Behind law. NNPS provides manuals, resources, evaluation opportunities, and on-going professional development for strengthening and maintaining programs of school, family,
and community partnerships. Summaries are given of four new requirements for reporting to parents and the public on their own child's test scores, changing from failing to better schools, providing supplementary services, and reporting to the public on school status, progress, and trends.
http://www.csos.jhu.edu/p2000/nochild.htm

A new report by the Center for Education Policy, From the Capital to the Classroom: State and Federal Efforts to Implement the No Child Left Behind Act, examines state and federal actions to implement No Child Left Behind during the inception year of the law. It raises issues to watch as states and school districts implement the Act and makes recommendations to ensure that no child is left behind.

The report is the result of a five month study of how the Act is being implemented by the Department of Education and state governments. The CEP read plans submitted to the federal government, conducted confidential interviews with state administrators and reviewed guidelines and regulations issued by the federal government.

Key Findings:
· states are committed to the goals of the legislation and are trying hard to carry them out, but the prescriptive nature of the requirements is causing great concern. States are moving faster on the elements of the law where they have more experience, such as developing state tests, and slower on aspects where they need to create new procedures, such as approving nonprofit and for-profit groups to provide tutoring.
· The fiscal crisis in most states, coupled with the prospect of limited additional federal aid, could threaten the successful implementation of this very ambitious law.
· Since the federal government continues to provide only about 7% of the total funding for public elementary and secondary schools, it may have trouble demanding 100% accountability from schools.

The report believes that the No Child Left Behind Act is too important to allow it to fail. The CEP proposes recommendations to ensure that student achievement can occur.
Among these recommendations are the following:
· The President and others ought to be careful about making grand promises for NCLB, because the challenges of carrying them out will soon become very clear. Our leaders should emphasize the soundness of these goals but also recognize how much work it will take at the state and local levels to accomplish them.
· To the extent possible, the Department should allow states to achieve the goals of the law without having to dismantle aspects of their assessment and accountability systems that are working well.
· The President and the Congress ought to fully fund the Act so states and school districts can go about making improvements. The U. S. Department of Education should also provide technical assistance to help states and districts find ways to raise student achievement through such means as improved professional development for teachers and more effective strategies to help students.

Schools Rely on Tests, but Study Raises Doubts : Rigorous high stakes testing that determines whether students graduate and which schools are rewarded or penalized does not improve achievement and may actually decrease academic performance. Greg Winter of the New York Times makes this argument in his response to a recent study by the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice.
www.nytimes.com/2002/12/28/education/28EXAM.html

States Worry New Law Sets Schools Up to Fail: New Orleans state education officials have issued a warning that a new federal law's requirement for minority students to show annual improvement in standardized testing will label the majority of the nation's schools as failures.
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A64246-2003Jan1.html