No Child Left Behind

No Child Left Behind has been seen to be one of the most significant education reform efforts in the United States recently.  Zhao (2009) stated in his article that this reform is intended to ensure that every child receives a good education so no child is left behind; its definition of good education is good scores on standardized tests in reading and math (p. 2). Zhao (2009) also introduces the idea that students who perform poorly on a state math or reading test are considered at risk; no matter how well they do in other areas. Schools, too, are judged by their students’ performance on math and reading tests, regardless of what other educational opportunities they provide (p. 3).

While some see these efforts as a positive way to get children to graduate on time and keep on track with their classmates, I cannot help but hold a strong opinion toward this reform. Mostly, I feel I hold such a strong opinion toward NCLB because of the school in which I came from. Do you feel it is a positive reform effort?

I live in a very small, diversely classed town. That is I come from a predominately white area, but you see a huge range of social classes. There is one public high school, in which I attended. Unless you are willing to travel far distances to put your child in another type of school, this is the high school in which you attended. While I am being stereotypical and classifying all teachers into one category, the teachers at my high school were for the most part very lazy. The football team ruled my school. The vice-principal, along with a lot of male teachers were on the coaching staff and it was a huge part of our school. Sometimes, it seemed as if that rose above our education.

I am giving this background because I feel as if NCLB can be very flawed. While I see that it is intended to help further those who may lose track and fall behind, I think the school and teachers have a huge part in how successful it can actually be.

At my school, as well as many others I am sure, you have to hold a certain GPA in order to participate in your sport. You fall behind that line, and you are out of the game until you pick up your GPA. Not my school. Because a lot of the staff was a part of the football team, a player may be failing a class, but magically their grade seemed to rise just in time for the important game coming up. Do you see why I feel such reform efforts like NCLB cannot be as successful as we want or may think they are?

While my example is a little different, I feel that NCLB and standardized testing is not a good indication of where a child may stand. We may be able to push a child to pass these exams in order to graduate, but are they truly receiving a good education like they deserve? I know at my school, information about taking these standardized tests were shoved down our throats close to examination time. We were not learning, we were taught how to pass the exam. Without reaching a certain standard overall, sports would be taken away from our school until the test scores were high enough, and of course football could never be taken away. So all of this effort was put into making sure the child passed the exam. It did not matter if they retained the knowledge or if they understood what they were doing, as long as they knew how to take an exam.

Fortunate enough for me, I cared about school so I tried to put forth effort into all of my work, while others passed without even trying. I feel NCLB can be the same type of way. It may be a good reform effort idea, but the context definitely matters. You have those teachers who will push the students to learn and get that education that they deserve, but you will have the lazy ones, who will simply coach the child to make sure they pass. I know at my school, the level at which we needed to be at was pretty low, so how is NCLB ensuring that students receive a better education overall? To me, it is not. What do you think?