Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announces a series of reforms to No Child Left Behind. (Tanner Howard/MNS)
Washington – Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced plans Monday for a significant change in the No Child Left Behind, the federal government’s landmark 2002 education law.
Duncan, in an address at an elementary School, framed the No Child Left Behind debate as a civil rights issue, noting the continued disparities between white students and students of color.
“The cost of academic failure has never been so high,” Duncan said.
While acknowledging growing calls from the Republican Party to limit standardized testing, one of the key elements of the law, Duncan said Barack Obama’s administration wants to keep yearly testing for grades three through eight. Yet he also offered proposals such as a nationwide cap on the amount of testing students can take, notifying parents when the level is exceeded.
Duncan also announced that President Obama would call for $2.7 billion in additional education funding in his upcoming 2015 budget. This will include $1 billion for Title 1 Schools, benefitting some of the nation’s poorest students, Duncan said.
But with Republicans controlling both houses of Congress, the promise of a big increase in federal education funding is far from guaranteed.
Senate Education Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., is expected to offer a proposal next week that will give states “the option” but not a “mandate” to take federal education money, suggesting that Obama’s calls for increased funding may meet resistance.
One of the most controversial aspects of No Child Left Behind has been mandated testing, which has faced criticism from across the political spectrum. Parents and educators say the law pressures schools to “teach to the test.” And conservative politicians see nationwide testing standards as federal overreach into state education policy.
Duncan’s calls for “fair, genuinely helpful methods of evaluation” demonstrate that the administration is not willing to entirely roll back the testing aspect of the law. Yet he indicated that the White House is open to eliminating “unnecessary” tests, offering a potential area of agreement between both parties.
“We must do more to ensure that the tests and the time spent preparing for them don’t take excessive time away from actual instruction,” Duncan said.
While this school year marks the first time a majority of public school students are non-white, Duncan highlighted the continued disparities between white and minority students , stressing that “equity and excellence matter more than ever.”
He noted that students of color have made great strides since President Lyndon Johnson signed The Elementary and Secondary Education Act into law in 1965.
Black and Latino students have seen a 1 million increase in college enrollment since 2008. Yet Duncan cautioned that an “insidious” achievement gap remains between white and non-white students.
“That lack of opportunity is not just heartbreaking,” Duncan said. “It is educational malpractice, it is morally bankrupt, and is economically self-destructive.”
Recent information suggests that the No Child Left Behind law has fallen short in combatting these ongoing issues.
Data collected by the Department of Education for the 2011-12 school year showed that students of color faced a range of problems at higher rates than their white counterparts. For example, black children constitute 18 percent of enrollment in preschools, but account for 42 percent of those suspended once.
“Educational opportunity cannot be optional for any child, anywhere in this country,” Duncan said.
