| Related
Articles and Events |
September 9, 2008 - Early Childhood, Elem, and Secondary Ed. Sub. Committee Hearing: "Challenges Facing Bureau of Indian Ed. Schools in Improving Student Achievement"
Washington D.C.-This past week OSEC Director Ted Hamilton testified in front of the Early Childhood, Elementry, and Secondary Ed. Sub. Committee on issues facing BIE funded Schools. Attached is the written testimony by Ted Hamilton, video on the hearing, and the direct address to the page.
Hearing Video
Written Testimony
http://edlabor.house.gov/hearings/ecese-2008-09-09.shtml
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June 20, 2007 - No Child Left
Behind leaves schools in a bind
Law has pushed about 2,300 schools
into the muddy waters of restructuring
NEW YORK - The scarlet letter in education these days
is an "R." It stands for restructuring —
the purgatory that schools are pushed into if they fail
to meet testing goals for six straight years under the
No Child Left Behind law.
Read
More...
October 28, 2004 - Good Intentions, Bad
Results |
| Robert J. Sternburg writes in this Education
Week article about the atrocities that federal
eduacation law known as NCLB foists upon schools, students,
teachers, parents, and administrators under the guise
of good intentions. He brings up known issues such as
the legilation's extensive underfunding and how smaller
schools in lower socioeconomic areas cannot be jusged
by the same yardstick as other more affluent schools.
He also introduces new issues such as how this standards
driven program preaches accountability when there is no
accountability for the quality of the standards themselves.
Click here to read more
reasons why NCLB needs to be revised or repealed... |
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| October 11, 2004 - State school board
to vote on GED program |
| HEY!!!! Have any students you think may fail the mandated
standardized tests? Just help them get their GED and get
them out of school. This article tells how a "state
school board," (Notice how it never mentions which
state school board...) has unanimously voted to do just
that. A course of study that normally requires participants
to be at least 17 years old and out of school for one
year is now going to be offered to 16 year olds who are
at risk of failure or of dropping out. So, instead
of providing for quality education, NCLB is forcing this
unmentioned state (Kentucky) to provide a true alternative
to AYP! Read
more about this "get-home-free card for superintendents..." |
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| October 11, 2004 - NCLB Downfalls |
| Joan Newkirk writes in the Maine Sunday Telegram (Portland
Press Herald) about what is wrong with NCLB as it
stands today. She notes, among other things, that the
law discourages diversity, sets schools and students up
for failure, and is (hmm...) under-funded. Read
all about it... |
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| October 11, 2004 - Voice of Experience |
| Joanne Yatvin has had the opportunity to observe many
schools overseas--in Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands,
and more--and in the United States. She has a few choice
words to impart with regards to NCLB and its heavy emphasis
on indescriminant testing. She also tells what happens
in those overseas countries to students who do not happen
to do well on the standardized national tests. She even
notes NCLB's effects on poor and minority children. Read
why she likes US education prior to NCLB... |
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| August 8, 2004 - No Child Left Behind
Scores Are Irrelevant |
| Cheryl Truman tells it like it is when it comes to "accountability
to test scores" in her Lexington Herald-Leader
article. She also asks some tough questions. Questions
like these: If your child fails in one school, does it
make sense to move to another school without knowing why
the child failed? Does it make sense to think a child
can pass Reading in another high school if she can only
read at an elementary level? Click
here for her take on standardized test scores and what
they mean... |
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| June 29, 2004 - Boston considers changing
four-year high school system |
| Boston Public Schools officials want to redesign the
traditional four-grade high school structure to allow
students to work at their own pace toward graduation.
Some students will be able to graduate in as little as
three years , whereas others may opt to go for up to five
years. Moreover, the new policy would allow students who
fail a course to retake only the course, not the entire
grade... (Boston
Globe) |
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| May 5, 2004--Rubber Tape Measure |
Marion Brady thinks back on his days working as a
construction laborer and remembers the initiation rite
where the experienced workers would ask the new worker
to "Go get the rubber tape measure." Such
a tape measure, says Brady, is being used in schools
today to determine things such as AYP, school instructional
accountability, etc...it is called a standardized test.
After reading this, one may be inclined to immediately
take advantage of the Oceti Sakowin Education Consortium's
expertise in Undetstanding by Design and Engaged Learning.
This instructional design method and teaching methodology
combine to help teachers get continuous, relevant assessement
for every child.
Click here to read
more from Marion Brady... |
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| May 4, 2004-NCLB Has Flaw...Not Enough
Accountability for Parents |
Columnist William Raspberry "suggests"
that the failure of NCLB is its assumption that school
failure is a willful act of teachers, administrators,
and other school employees. He continues by noting that
there are no reprisals withing NCLB for parents who
do not give enough help at home. How is this related
to AYP? Here is a quote from the article: ""The
problem is that there are 37 criteria that have to be
met for 'adequate yearly progress,"' Packer explains.
"If a school meets 36 of the 37, it's deemed a
failure as the school that got zero of the 37. And even
if students are growing academically, they may not be
growing at a fast enough pace to avoid failure. Say
the goal is the 65th percentile in English, and you
bring a group of kids up from the 35th to the 60th,
you've still failed."
Click
here to read more... The News & Observer
(Raleigh, N.C.) No registration required!! |
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| April 30, 2004-New Policy Issued for Calculating
Participation Rates Under NCLB |
To help states implement the accountability provisions
in the No Child Left Behind Act, the U.S. Department
of Education recently announced new flexibility for
calculating the percentage of students who participate
on state assessments in reading and mathematics. In
order to make adequate yearly progress (AYP), schools
and school districts must demonstrate that at least
95 percent of students, both in aggregate and as subgroups,
participated in the state's assessment program.
Click
here to find more info in the NCLB
Achiever ... |
|
| April 29, 2004-An improving school fails
to meet federal targets |
Last year, Lake Alfred (Fla.) Elementary registered
gains in six assessment categories, prompting state
officials to raise its overall grade from a C to a B
and award it a cash bonus. However, the good news was
short-lived when weeks later, the school learned had
failed to meet NCLB adequate yearly progress standards
due to the performance of its 34 special education students.
Click here
to read this NY Times Article... (Reprint
within www.osdlc.org) |
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| April 22, 2004 -- Key to accountability:
What are we locking out? |
Longtime Florida educator Marion Brady says we can
all learn from the leadership of Nebraska school chief
Doug Christensen, who says, "I don't give a damn
what No Child Left Behind says. I think education is
far too complex to be
reduced to a single score. . . . If it's bad for kids,
we're not going to do it." --Susan Ohanian
By Marion Brady | Special to the Sentinel
Posted April 22, 2004
Click
here to read this Orlando Sentinel
article...
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| April 22, 2004 -- Students who passed
pushed to retake AIMS...to Boost District Rankings |
Pat Kossan and Mel Meléndez
The Arizona Republic
Apr. 22, 2004 12:00 AM
About 50,000 Arizona sophomores are taking the high
school AIMS math test today because they have to, but
some juniors and seniors have been enticed to voluntarily
take it again.
Some principals encouraged older students who already
passed the Arizona Instrument to Measure Standards test
to take it again because they want to push their school
to a "highly performing" or "excelling"
ranking. Click
here to review this NCLB AYP strategy... |
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| April 22, 2004 -- 'No Child' Law Leaves
Schools' Old Ways Behind |
By Michael Dobbs
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, April 22, 2004; Page A01
President Bush's education initiative means many schools
must drop arts and extracurriculars to focus on test results
and accountability. NCLB's emphasis on testing and accountability
has forced schools to focus their curricula on boosting
students' reading and math skills. As schools redirect
their instructional time toward core subjects, many have
had to slash foreign language classes, art courses and
extracurricular activities. Click
here to read the full article...
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| April 20, 2004 -- Update on NCLB: State
backlashes, new flexibility... |
| Over the past month, states have continued to express
serious reservations regarding No Child Left Behind implementation
efforts, culminating in the release of a letter to Secretary
Paige—signed by 14 state superintendents—asking
for greater flexibility in addressing key components of
the law. Click
here to read the EDPolicy Update
article... |
|
| April 13, 2004 -- School leaders learn
how to use data to improve instruction |
By Corey Murray, Assistant Editor, eSchool News
April 13, 2004
Data-driven decision making and the No Child Left Behind
Act (NCLB) were the focus of a conference held April 8
in Washington, D.C. Sponsored by the Consortium for School
Networking (CoSN), the event featured national lawmakers
as well as educators and other stakeholders who have a
vested interest in seeing children succeed in the classroom.
Click
here to read the entire eSchool News
article... |
|
| February 17, 2004 -- Seeking Alternatives
to Standardized Testing |
By Jay Mathews
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 17, 2004; 10:46 AM
Deborah Meier is my favorite answer to an important question:
Is there some other way to make low-income neighborhood
schools better than through the annual standardized testing
required by the new federal No Child Left Behind law?
In 1974 she created the Central Park East School in the
East Harlem neighborhood of New York City. That school
showed, through its students' success in college and the
workplace, that the children of day laborers, garment
workers and welfare recipients could achieve academic
success by being treated in public school as if they were
graduate students. Instead of being given regular standardized
multiple-choice tests, they were evaluated through reviews
of their written work and interviews with experts in the
subject matter they had studied.
It has been more than a year since I last wrote about
Meier, co-principal of the Mission Hill School in Boston,
and her latest book, "In Schools We Trust."
Her perspective has become even more significant as the
No Child Left Behind (NCLB) rules hit all American public
schools. So I asked her if she would be willing to have
an e-mail conversation with me about what is going on,
and what we should be doing about it. Here is the result:
Click
here for the rest of this Washington
Post article...
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| March 24, 2004 -- Ten Changes Needed To
Improve NCLB (From NEA) |
| NEA originally released this list in January 2004. Since
then, Secretary of Education Rod Paige has announced several
changes to the "No Child Left Behind" Act (NCLB)
rules. The Secretary has validated NEA's position that
common-sense changes were needed to NCLB by adopting parts
of three of our proposed changes. However, much more needs
to be done and additional resources need to be provided.
Click
here to see the ten (10) changes needed most to improve
NCLB... |
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