'No Child Left Behind': the not-so-hidden agenda

by Ron Whitehorne

Backers of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), passed by Congress in 2001 with the active support of the Bush administration, say the law will improve public schools through increased accountability and school choice.

But in the minds of many public school advocates, the real intent of this law is to grease the skids for privatization of schools serving under-resourced communities – a replay of what has happened in Philadelphia during the last two years, only on a national scale.

NCLB creates a whole series of hurdles that public schools must meet:

• A greatly expanded testing program will measure student achievement, with the goal being 100 percent of students meeting the standard of proficiency within 12 years.
• Schools must meet the goal of "a highly qualified teacher in every classroom" by 2005.
• School systems must provide opportunities for students in failing schools to transfer to a better performing school in the same district.

Dollars don’t match expectations

While few would argue with these goals, many are skeptical that they can be met without significant school spending increases. While NCLB increases federal funding by 18 percent, an additional $3.5 billion, many doubt that this is enough to pay for the mandates now imposed on the public schools.

Stan Karp of the Rethinking Schools editorial board pointed out that "the extra dollars…are already threatened by the administration’s ‘war budget’, which calls for eliminating 26 of the federal programs just reauthorized" in the current federal education budget.

The gap between expectations and resources led National Education Association President Reg Weaver to characterize NCLB as "the granddaddy of all underfunded federal mandates."

These federal mandates are also coming at a time when local and state governments are reeling from both cuts in federal spending and economic recession. The unwillingness of the Republican-dominated Pennsylvania legislature to fund Governor Rendell’s education budget is a case in point.

The prospects for meeting the lofty teacher quality goals for NCLB are bleak. According to Sandra Feldman, president of the American Federation of Teachers, "17 percent of all secondary students and 26 percent of low-income secondary students are taught by teachers who are not certified in the subject they teach."