Empty Thread

[dejr_8]

No comment

 

[Chicago526]

Why do you think it will go away. Did Obama promise that?

He intends to reform it.

http://www.barackobama.com/issues/education/

 

[debbi801]

Another Marylander here...

There was a meeting with the state board of education, asking that the high school assessment piece needed for graduation be revamped, because right now it is not fair to special education students or ESOL students. It was denied.

As the mother of 3 kids, the youngest of whom is special needs, I think it stinks. From the day they get back from Christmas break until the end of March when they take the tests, the kids do nothing but prep for the tests. They learn nothing new, they don't get their electives (like art or music), all they do is practice taking the test and learn what will be on the test. Thn, they spend a week taking the tests. My youngest hasn't been exposed yet, since he is only in the 1st grade. He already has huge anxiety issues. I know that he won't be able to successfully take this test.

My brother teaches English in an inner city school. They're perpetually losing funding or at risk for losing funding based on their test scores. And, this is a school that cannot afford basic school necessities (like text books) as it is.

And don't even get me started on the need to look for the "hidden" opt out clause on my high school son's paper work at the beginning of the school year so that I can request that the military doesn't solicit him.

 

[JimmyPicker]

I don't like NCLB for a lot of different reasons, but I have to admit that it's been great for the local elementary school my children attend.

Last year was the first year my son was old enough to take the tests. They did extremely well. In reading, his grade in his school had 100%, compared to 83% average for the rest of the state. In math, his grade had 94% compared to 83% for the rest of the state. So our school does extremely well on the testing.

The bad part about this is the fact that the week before testing, my child missed two days of school. The counselor called me and begged me to send my child to school because testing was coming up, it was so important that he does well, blah blah blah.

I told her that I knew the testing is extremely important to them, but so was the fact that my child had been spewing for days! Did they really want a puking kid in the classroom making everyone else sick?

The kids get so bored during the review time they set aside for the tests (it's weeks!) because they keep going over the same stuff, over and over again. They take practice tests, they review the tests, more practice tests. By the time the real tests get here, the kids are stressed out and burnt out.

 

[mrsltg]

Like most laws it addresses the problem with more red tape. The idea of the law is great. A lot of people tend to conveniently forget there is a reason for the law. Schools are failing and kids are going along with it. Of course the way to fix such things is not through Federal law but oh well! Now, we have another behemoth and blame can be placed on it rather than addressing the real issues.

 

[mamacatnv]

I am not a fan of NCLB for many reasons. The main reason being that the above average kids are left to their own devices.

Example:
My DD's former elem. school received a $250,000 grant that was to be used her 3rd grade year. The school hired additional special ed aids, ESL aids and implemented several new programs to bring the non-english speakers and the special ed kids up to the bar. Every single penny of that money was spent on the lower end of the schools population and not a penny was spent for some sort of enrichment program for the upper kids. While I understand why it happened, I do not think it should have happened.

The school is still classified as "non achieving" and every year they tell us it is because of the special ed kids.

The emphasis put on the testing and the things that are told to the kids ie: you need to do well so you can go to 4th grade etc. is ridiculous but I do understand where it is coming from.

Another issue I have is that all kids are included in a classroom the majority of the time. The ones with behavior problems, the ones with learning problems and the ones that are average and above average. I do not understand how any one of these kids gets what they need on a daily basis from this type of setting.

I had enough - I moved my above average DD to a Charter School that has a high academic standard and will not lower their standards to accomodate kids that cannot keep up.

While I get the reasoning behind NCLB I as a parent view it as a dismal failure and a detriment to the future of our kids.

 

[Colleen27]

Not looking for a debate.

I truly don't understand the issue. I know many many people say they don't like it because they are teaching to a test. But isn't that the idea. We want kids to learn a certain set of concepts in each grade. So you test them on those concepts and thus it would seem to follow that you need to teach what is on the test. - What am I missing?

I have problems with it for several reasons.

First of all, the stated goal of having all students performing on grade level is impossible. There will always be students too disabled to perform at the required level, students too new to our country and our language to perform at the required level, etc.

Second, it penalizes schools for good decisions. Before NCLB, our school had a dedicated special ed program at one of the 5 elementary schools in the district, rather than having redundant staff at each school for a very small number of children. Because of the NCLB requirements, that program has been cut because it would pull the host school's scores down disproportionately and eventually lead to funding sanctions.

Third, too much time is taken out of learning to spend on testing. My kids are in 2nd and 4th grade. They start teaching standardized test taking strategies in the 2nd grade in preparation for testing in 3rd. Two full weeks are spent on the testing itself, and real learning doesn't start until after the testing (in mid-Oct) because up until that point it is reviewing likely test material, practicing fill-in-the-bubble style testing, etc. And hand-in-hand with that is the scaling back on subjects not covered by testing in order to spend more time drilling the math & reading skills that will be tested.

Fourth, it judges schools based solely on the bottom tier. It is all about getting the poor students up to speed, which too often takes away from offering top students any sort of appropriate challenge. It also puts pressure on schools to retain underperforming children rather than promote them with extra help, even though the research shows promotion to be the better approach for the child, because testing takes place in the fall before the child has seen much improvement from the extra support services.

 

[Eeyores Butterfly]

The idea behind it is a good one, but the execution is poor:

-It is severely underfunded. They mandate all these things but schools don't have the money to back it up.

-In education, one of the number rules is that you do not make an individual decision based on one test, but this is exactly what NCLB does. One of my profs consults with local districts and was asked to talk to a couple of students who failed the test but were straight A students. One student's grandmother died in the middle of the test week, another student got pneumonia and missed a couple of days. The day or two he was there he was not feeling well. Both of these scores counted against the school and were not an accurate measure.

-At least in Missouri teachers aren't allowed to know what is on the test. The standard wisdom is that you tie your curriculum to assessment, but if you don't know what the kids are tested over you can't do that.

-Children in special ed are expected to perform on the same level as their neuro-typical peers. I've had students who gained more than one grade level in a year but still did not perform on their grade level. These scores were counted against the school. The tests don't look at improvement, they look at one flat score.

-If a school does not perform, money gets taken away from it and students get to move to another school if they want which the home school has to pay for. So the school loses money and is unable to make improvements.

-The law is simply unrealistic. By 2014 literally 100% of students must perform at grade level. NO school is going to be able to achieve that. While it's a nice sentiment, they have set the bar well above what is attainable and will punish schools for not reaching it. This is the biggest issue. The bar gets exponentially higher each year. Already this year some very good school districts are considered failing because one population in the entire school did not meet proficiency. Next year it will be worse.

The bottom line, while accountability is good, the law does not take real life into account. How do you teach a student with severe behavior problems who just does not care and never does their homework or listen in class? I try hard, but there are many times I cannot get through to this student. How do you teach a student whose brother is missing, presumed kidnapped and possibly dead? Obviously that student is not focused on school at the moment. How do you teach a student when both parents work night shift and the kids are left to get themselves in bed at night and up in the morning and there is nobdoy there to help them with their school work? These are all situations I have seen. The law does not take that into account.

 

[harleyquinn]

OP do you understand why there is hate for NCLB yet?

Is there anything we can answer for you so you understand better?

I can say one thing...every single teacher I know (DH is one and I'm a librarian so I know A LOT) HATES NCLB. I don't need to know more than that (tho I do). This isn't a bad teacher here or there complaining about it, these are fantastic, award-winning, amazing teachers who all hate what it is doing to the education system.

 

[Cindy B]

OP, thanks for starting this topic, as I have always wondered about this myself. I don't have kids yet, so I'm not totally familiar with all the requirements.

I have a couple of questions.

1) Do all special needs students get either special consideration (like more time to take the test) or get to exempt the test if they truly cannot perform to the standard level? It seems unfair to me if allowances are not made for special needs students.

2) It seems to me that NCLB could sometimes work to point out a teacher that isn't great. I realize that it's a two-edged sword, but there are some teachers out there that are truly abysmal. It doesn't seem to me that they should just automatically get tenure even if they are not doing a good job. I'm not saying that it's always by choice that the teacher isn't performing well. For example, when I was in high school my AP Biology teacher had been teaching for 25 years. She was terrific, and the vast majority of her students got 4's or 5's on the AP exam. My friend was very diligent in working with the kids, but she just wasn't ready for that level of class right out of the gate. Couldn't NCLB help identify that?

3) I really feel for inner city schools. If kids aren't getting fed at home, school tends to drop on the priority list. Often school is the only safe place for at-risk kids. Plus, I know that many inner city school teachers are truly gifted at working with these kids. But sometimes there's just no way for these kids to perform at grade level if they started out as very much behind.

You have some very valid points.

1- Depending on the type of student, there may or may not be special accomodations-- such as having a scribe, oral questions read, or the use of "readers". Now readers aren't actual humans reading the text to them, but it is a small handheld device that a student places on the text which acts like a ruler or a highlighter.

I've also heard of some extra time involved but that is a harder accommodation. I've only seen the scribes, the readers and use of small group.

The modifications need to be written in the IEP before test time. Basically, the student still has to take the test unless they meet the APA requirements.

I can't tell you how many students I have seen that can't read it, get frustrated with it and can't even handle the scantron set up (filling in the bubbles with the correct question) but don't qualify for the APA.

They either leave the test card blank or just fill in pretty patterns.

2= It is my understanding that some schools give "allowances" for NCLB grades. A principal or superintendent should be discerning enough to realize a teacher with limited experience versus teachers with many years experience.

3- Yes, the inner city is rough. My students get minimal involvement at home. They aren't read to, and some don't even have books to read. They are so far behind that I might get them at grade level before I leave in December. For example, one of my students didn't know the word medicine. This came up yesterday. They knew the word, they could explain it, but couldn't write anything about it. The student's context clues and inferential processes were so poort they couldn't understand the concept.

 

[Goofyluver]

Oh lordy...don't even get me started.

Shall I speak as a special educator or as a parent?

I'll pick parent for now.

My DS is disabled. He is in 7th grade and is functioning on about a 3rd grade level.

Due to NCLB, he is forced to take the same tests that all 7th graders take.

Then, when he does not pass those tests, he brings down the average for an entire school.

If there are enough sped students in a school, enough to make a subgroup, then the entire school will fail to meet AYP if those students do not meet AYP. The majority of schools fail to meet AYP due to their subgroups, such as sped, ELL, etc.

NCLB is teaching to the tests. No...that's absolutely not what we want. The focus has shifted from teaching the basics to teaching the answers.

Students such as my son are not only left behind, they are forgotten...but are then blamed for an entire school failing to meet AYP.

NCLB is a joke. It forces us as educators to change from teaching, to guiding correct test scores.

 

[Eeyores Butterfly]

Several people mentioned how it is bringing down the gifted students. Unfortunately, this has been happening for years but NCLB has made it even worse.

I was put in a gifted program in elementary school, and I was told it was specifically so I wouldn't skip a grade. Four days a week I was in my regular classroom and one day was gifted ed. At the elementary level I was very lucky that my teachers went above and beyond to challenge me, they would have a hard time doing that now. When I hit middle school it all changed.

By the time I got to ninth grade, I had received the message loud and clear that the school didn't care about their gifted students. I skipped the rest of high school and went to college when I was 15.

This problem is becoming even more pronounced thank to NCLB. After all, the gifted kids are able to pass the test before they set foot inside the classroom, why waste our time helping them? I want to get my gifted certification as soon as I'm eligible,but I doubt it will do much good. As soon as NCLB passed, the state of Missouri cut gifted funding from 25 million to zero in the space of one year. It's pathetic.

 

[Colleen27]

-The law is simply unrealistic. By 2014 literally 100% of students must perform at grade level. NO school is going to be able to achieve that. While it's a nice sentiment, they have set the bar well above what is attainable and will punish schools for not reaching it. This is the biggest issue. The bar gets exponentially higher each year. Already this year some very good school districts are considered failing because one population in the entire school did not meet proficiency. Next year it will be worse.

Sometimes I wonder if it really is a law crafted with good intention, or if it is a backdoor method of gaining support for the privatization of public schools. Often the path to privatization of govt services is paved with legislation that undermines a public entity's effectiveness and sets up a situation where failure is almost unavoidable. Then when that failure happens, they can point to it as a failure of the public sector.

 

[Eeyores Butterfly]

Sometimes I wonder if it really is a law crafted with good intention, or if it is a backdoor method of gaining support for the privatization of public schools. Often the path to privatization of govt services is paved with legislation that undermines a public entity's effectiveness and sets up a situation where failure is almost unavoidable. Then when that failure happens, they can point to it as a failure of the public sector.

Hmmm, never thought about it that way. I tend to think that the powers that be have good intentions, it's just that the people making the policy are not educators and therefore don't know what they are doing. If what you say is the truth then that is very disturbing indeed.

 

[dejr_8]

No comment

 

[DisMN]

OP do you understand why there is hate for NCLB yet?

Is there anything we can answer for you so you understand better?

I can say one thing...every single teacher I know (DH is one and I'm a librarian so I know A LOT) HATES NCLB. I don't need to know more than that (tho I do). This isn't a bad teacher here or there complaining about it, these are fantastic, award-winning, amazing teachers who all hate what it is doing to the education system.

I have many teachers in my family and this is how they feel about NCLB too. My biggest question is then how on earth did this trash become The Thing in our schools? How did that happen??

 

[harleyquinn]

Well in response I will give you an example from my industry - Biotech. We have to produce drugs under what are called cGMPs (that stands for current Good Manufacturing Practices). They are a PAIN IN THE BEHIND to follow and they often make you do things that are butt-backwards. I don't know a single person that has to follows the cGMPs says "I LOVE THEM". Does that make the cGMPs wrong?

No, definitely not. The teachers I know don't hate NCLB because it's annoying, they hate it because they see first hand what it does to the students they are teaching. There is a major difference here and I think you recognize that. Please, give teachers credit in realizing what is good or really bad for teaching.

 

[DisMN]

NCLB is teaching to the tests. No...that's absolutely not what we want. The focus has shifted from teaching the basics to teaching the answers.

I almost pooped a brick when my granddaughter told me this.
I thought she was telling fibs about how her teacher was giving them the answers to their tests and it didn't matter if the kids knew how they came up with the answer or not, the most important vital thing was to put the right answer in the box......NCLB seems to be leaving ALL the kids behind. What a terrible terrible shame.

 

[mamacatnv]

Well in response I will give you an example from my industry - Biotech. We have to produce drugs under what are called cGMPs (that stands for current Good Manufacturing Practices). They are a PAIN IN THE BEHIND to follow and they often make you do things that are butt-backwards. I don't know a single person that has to follows the cGMPs says "I LOVE THEM". Does that make the cGMPs wrong?

I fail to see the correlation......... are the drugs on the market under achieving or failing standardized test? Is one 3mg pain pill being expected to perform as well as the same 8mg pain pill? I don't understand your point

back to the topic - What do you all think of privatization of the education system?

 

[ead79]

You have some very valid points.

1- Depending on the type of student, there may or may not be special accomodations-- such as having a scribe, oral questions read, or the use of "readers". Now readers aren't actual humans reading the text to them, but it is a small handheld device that a student places on the text which acts like a ruler or a highlighter.

I've also heard of some extra time involved but that is a harder accommodation. I've only seen the scribes, the readers and use of small group.

The modifications need to be written in the IEP before test time. Basically, the student still has to take the test unless they meet the APA requirements.

I can't tell you how many students I have seen that can't read it, get frustrated with it and can't even handle the scantron set up (filling in the bubbles with the correct question) but don't qualify for the APA.

They either leave the test card blank or just fill in pretty patterns.

2= It is my understanding that some schools give "allowances" for NCLB grades. A principal or superintendent should be discerning enough to realize a teacher with limited experience versus teachers with many years experience.

3- Yes, the inner city is rough. My students get minimal involvement at home. They aren't read to, and some don't even have books to read. They are so far behind that I might get them at grade level before I leave in December. For example, one of my students didn't know the word medicine. This came up yesterday. They knew the word, they could explain it, but couldn't write anything about it. The student's context clues and inferential processes were so poort they couldn't understand the concept.

Thanks for your responses. I'm glad to hear that some allowances are available, though it sounds like that needs expanding.

To your point about a principal being discerning enough to not put a 1st year teacher in an AP level class, I guess that's always mystified me. I guess in my mind the fact that her school failed to meet the NCLB standards should help point out that the principal lacks some discernment. I wish it actually did help to point out these problems, but instead it sounds like it's a nightmare when put into practice.

Thanks for doing what you do with kids who come in at a major disadvantage. We need more folks like you!