NCLB - Education's Worst Nightmare

Here's what will happen with Bush's educational blackmail. There will be no artists, no musicians, no original thinkers to dream of the solutions. No scientists who will cure the worst of our ills. No visionaries and diplomats that know the world and can bring peace. Some students see their schedules whittled down to two subjects?? Their love of learning, sometimes sparked by classes now threatened, will leave. In it's place will be a non achieving drone with no desire to excel. And the worst part is that no one has done the math, created the study, to see if there is an actual improvement with these draconian measures.

Teachers have always been challenged to help children read. More attention needs to be placed on education at home, I firmly believe that, including parents who give a child a book to read (or better - reads with them) instead of letting him turn on the TV or computer.

The system is using educational blackmail in hopes that the under achiever will be motivated by punishment to get back to the courses they love.

Bush has not only done tremendous harm to our nation, he's also set education on a path to incompetency.

http://nytimes.com/2006/03/26/education/26child.html

Schools from Vermont to California are increasing — in some cases tripling — the class time that low-proficiency students spend on reading and math, mainly because the federal law, signed in 2002, requires annual exams only in those subjects and punishes schools that fall short of rising benchmarks.

The survey, by the Center on Education Policy, found that since the passage of the federal law, 71 percent of the nation's 15,000 school districts had reduced the hours of instructional time spent on history, music and other subjects to open up more time for reading and math. The center is an independent group that has made a thorough study of the new act and has published a detailed yearly report on the implementation of the law in dozens of districts.

About 125 of the school's lowest-performing students are barred from taking anything except math, reading and gym, a measure that Samuel Harris, a former lieutenant colonel in the Army who is the school's principal, said was draconian but necessary. "When you look at a kid and you know he can't read, that's a tough call you've got to make," Mr. Harris said.

"Because of its emphasis on testing and accountability in particular subjects, it apparently forces some school districts down narrow intellectual paths," Dr. Reese said. "If a subject is not tested, why teach it?"

The historian David McCullough told a Senate Committee last June that because of the law, "history is being put on the back burner or taken off the stove altogether in many or most schools, in favor of math and reading."

The report says that at districts in Colorado, Texas, Vermont, California, Nebraska and elsewhere, math and reading are squeezing other subjects. At one district cited, the Bayonne City Schools in New Jersey, low-performing ninth graders will be barred from taking Spanish, music or any other elective next fall so they can take extra periods of math and reading, said Ellen O'Connor, an assistant superintendent.

"We're using that as a motivation," Dr. O'Connor said. "We're hoping they'll concentrate on their math and reading so they can again participate in some course they love."