— J. Scott Applewhite/AP
To celebrate the 7-year anniversary of the No Child Left Behind Act, President Bush visited a school in a socioeconomically and racially diverse neighborhood near Philadelphia’s center city on Wednesday, as reported in this article in Education Week.
Bush’s statements seem to be just his last effort to keep some vestige of his legacy alive. We have seen his failings in many other areas, and education is just another. I am not a supporter of the specifics of the NCLB, though I do think there should be some accountability for schools at the federal level, this law was designed to punish our schools, not to improve them.
Bush said,
“As president of the United States, this is the last policy address I will give,” Mr. Bush said Thursday morning at General Philip Kearny Elementary School, a K-8 school in the Philadelphia district, on the seventh anniversary of his signing of the federal education law. “What makes it interesting is that it’s the same subject of my first policy address as president of the United States, which is education and education reform. I hope you can tell that education is dear to my heart. I care a lot about whether or not our children can learn to read, write, and add and subtract.”
While education may be dear to President Bush’s heart some questions still linger about this legislation. 1) Why does NCLB not fund schools to make necessary changes to personnel and curriculum? 2) Why are schools that show improvement still punished? 3) Why are “failing” schools closed and re-opened by private schools using public funds? 4) Why are there no consistent guidelines from between states, or even between districts on how to measure progress? 5) Why does the law equate testing with teaching?
Bush had this to say about the criticism of NCLB’s heavy reliance on standardized tests:
“I’ve heard every excuse in the book why we should not test—‘Oh, there’s too many tests; you teach the test; testing is intrusive; testing is not the role of government,’” the president said. “How can you possibly determine whether a child can read at grade level if you don’t test? And for those who claim we’re teaching the test, uh-uh. We’re teaching a child to read so he or she can pass the test.”
The problem with this statement is that a standardized test that examines skills in isolation is actually a poor way to assess a student’s true level of reading comprehension. Moreover, the testing does not begin until 3rd grade when we expect most students to already know how to read, but we are interested if they can understand what they are reading.
Sadly, he may done even more harm to Obama’s choice for Secretary of Education, saying of Duncan, “he is going to be the next secretary of education. And we are fortunate he has agreed to take on this position. And we wish him all the very best.” In an environment where politicians seem to be distancing themselves from the President as much as possible, a ringing endorsement coming from him may not be beneficial – it sure didn’t help John McCain.
Further Reading
- Bush to Tout His ‘No Child Left Behind’ Initiative on Wall Street Journal
- Bush Calls for Resolve on NCLB Renewal on Education Week
- Leaving Some Children Behind: The Unintended Consequences of No Child Left Behind by Doug Morrisey
- Many Children Left Behind: How the No Child Left Behind Act Is Damaging Our Children and Our Schools
[...] the No Child Left Behind Act – just another example of this law’s shortcomings that outgoing President Bush continues to trumpet as his greatest success. The same as what is being done to historical facts is being done to American students – they are [...]