NCLB: Dreams and Nightmares

The idea of leaving no child behind may sound like a noble dream. But the federal law intended to fulfill that dream is in Mr. Houston's opinion so flawed that it has become a nightmare for educators.

By Paul D. Houston

IT IS MY understanding that humans share many of the same nightmares, like going to a party with no clothes on or showing up for the final exam in a class you forgot to attend or, on the happier side, falling from a cliff and discovering that you can fly. Today, educators share a nightmare known as NCLB (or "Nickelbee" for the alphabetically impaired). Sadly, the No Child Left Behind Act is a nightmare in which everyone is naked while being pushed off a cliff because of poor test performance.

The Nickelbee nightmare has many variations. One involves trying to fill every classroom with a "highly qualified teacher." But in Nightmareland, highly qualified doesn't necessarily mean good. It means the teacher took the right number of subject-area courses in college and is teaching only those subjects. A certified chemistry teacher is not a highly qualified biology teacher. A middle school teacher certified as an elementary teacher is not highly qualified for middle school English. (Didn't we create middle schools so we could get away from the rigidity of the junior high school curriculum?)

The big exception is teachers who have taken no education courses but apply for alternative certification. The day they apply for certification, they become highly qualified. This is the magical approach to becoming highly qualified and proves that the bureaucrats who draft these laws have a sense of humor. Of course, highly qualified teachers don't have to be good teachers pedagogically, and they certainly don't need to be kind or compassionate toward children. They just need to show they mastered their subject areas.

The Nickelbee nightmare also involves explaining to your community why your award-winning school is on the list of those that need to improve because you didn't make AYP (adequate yearly progress) in every sub-area with every subgroup. You might try to explain how progress isn't really progress because you aren't measuring the same children. You might explain that your school failed because one or two children were absent on test day, which dropped you below the 95% threshold for attendance. You might also have to explain why kids who have been identified for special education now have to meet the same standards as those who have not been so identified. In other words, students with special needs aren't really special when it comes to achieving common results. Makes one wonder why we have spent billions on special education when we could have just tested all those children to greatness. Oh, and don't forget that you have to make sure that students who come to you from Albania in third grade and who don't speak English will master that subject and the first three years of the curriculum in one year so that by fourth grade they are "proficient."

I could go on, but like swatting flies at a watermelon-eating contest, it is just too easy to make fun of Nickelbee. The fact is that the goals of the law are fine. I haven't found one educator who doesn't agree with the high-minded goals of Nickelbee. I haven't met an educator who thinks it is just fine to leave some kids behind. Many have swallowed hard in their efforts to embrace the law because it is an attempt to create more equitable expectations for our students. The President has talked about the soft bigotry of low expectations, and most educators I know agree that the phrase describes a real problem.

No one wants to see a single child left behind. In fact, it is a tribute to the nation's teachers and administrators that, despite the inanity of the law's details, they are working hard to implement it and make it work. From the coercive aspects of the law, one might think that the drafters thought children were being left behind on purpose. Why would people enter a profession as pressurized and thankless as teaching if they wanted to prevent some children from reaching their dreams? If policy makers really believe that, then we have a bigger failure to communicate than when we attempt to explain the law to parents. At some point, we need to discuss the hard bigotry of high expectations without adequate resources. It is no accident that most of the children left behind are clustered in poor schools in poor neighborhoods. That fact doesn't seem to get discussed much.

Further, no one argues that unqualified teachers belong in classrooms. No district advertises for poorly qualified teachers. The fact is that some schools are harder to staff than others. And we have to remember that private schools have made their reputations using uncertified teachers. (Come to think of it, private schools don't have the public accountability or testing requirements of Nicklebee.)

Educators welcome responsible accountability, and public schools have been open to public scrutiny on a regular basis. They are the one place where you can call public officials to account in a very public manner.

It is not the goals of Nickelbee that are problematic, nor its implementation and funding. They are fixable. We can modify the law to make certain that accountability occurs in ways that actually make sense by using the right assessment tools and measurements. We can raise the caliber of teachers in the classrooms by reshaping the qualities we seek in teachers and changing our incentives under a reasonable timetable. More money will help, but money alone is insufficient.

THE FACT is that the law has design flaws. The real reason that Nicklebee resembles a group nightmare is the lack of truth that permeates it. It is a search for weapons of mass mis-instruction that simply aren't there.

The fact is that we as a nation aren't really trying to leave no child behind. If we were, we would be doing much more than we are. We would recognize that we have an interrelated set of issues to confront and that they are bigger than a breadbox. Let me demonstrate by asking some questions.

If we really intended to leave no child behind, wouldn't we be worried about the kind of start children are getting? Wouldn't we see to it that those most likely to be left behind get reasonable pre- and postnatal health care so that by the time they get to school they haven't already fallen behind because of chronic health issues? Wouldn't we want to make sure that they are parented by people who can provide the kind of mental and emotional support a developing child needs? Might not that mean more parent education and the creation of a safety net around the parents of young children to help them in this vital work? Wouldn't we want to make sure that those most likely to fall behind get a better head start by having preschool programs available to them that develop their intellect by applying all we know about the development of young children?

If we really wanted to leave no child behind, wouldn't we see to it that those most likely to fall behind have the best teachers we can find? Wouldn't that mean "caring" as well as "qualified" teachers? Wouldn't we pursue policies that create incentives for our best teachers to work with those children who are most difficult to educate? Wouldn't we want to make sure that the schools these children attend have the best technology and learning materials we can find, and wouldn't we house them in the finest facilities? Wouldn't we make sure that different learning styles are accommodated to capitalize on their strengths? Wouldn't we make the school day and year flexible in order to accommodate different learning speeds?

If we really wanted to make sure no child was left behind, wouldn't we make certain that schools are so personal that all children have access to adults who know them well and who care about them? Doesn't that imply moving away from our fixation on economies of scale and efficiency and moving toward smaller and more intimate learning environments? Wouldn't we provide many different activities to motivate and engage students in learning so that they run into the schools in the morning with the same energy and exuberance as they run out with in the afternoon?

If we really believed that all children are going to be highly proficient by 2014, wouldn't we be seeing major shifts in funding to make certain that those with the greatest needs receive the greatest resources? Wouldn't we also be seeing a massive effort to build up our universities to accommodate the crush of students who will soon be able to handle university work?

Sadly, no answers are being offered to any of these questions. In our quest for accountability, shouldn't we also be holding the politicians and bureaucrats accountable for creating systems that move beyond rhetoric so that we could truly remake American education into a system in which every child succeeds and in which each child's hopes are allowed to soar? If not, we must ask, "Where will we see no child left behind?" In our dreams.

PAUL D. HOUSTON is executive director of the American Association of School Administrators, Arlington, Va.