The No Child Left Behind Act

When President George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) into law in 2002, the legislation had one goal-- to improve educational equity for all students in the United States by implementing standards for student achievement and school district and teacher performance. Before the No Child Left Behind Act, the program of study for most schools was developed and implemented by individual states and local communities’ school boards. Proponents of the NCLB believed that lax oversight and lack of measurable standards by state and local communities was leading to the failure of the education system and required federal government intervention to correct. At the time, the Act seemed to be what the American educational system

The "No Child Left Behind Act" (Public Law 107-110, 115), is a Congressional Act signed into law by George W. Bush in January 2002. The Bill was a bi-partisan initiative, supported by Senator Edward Kennedy, and authorized a number of federal programs designed to improve standards for educational accountability across all States, districts, and increase the focus on reading. Much of the NCLB focus is based on the view that American students are falling behind in educational basis when scored are compared globally. The Act does not establish a national achievement standard; each State must confirm its own set of standards, but in order to receive funding, the States must meet a basic criterion of performance (Abernathy, 2007).

On January 8, 2002, George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act into law (also known as the NCLB). The No Child Left Behind Act was the latest reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, a federal education bill addressing the nation’s schools. At his signing ceremony, Bush stated, “There’s no greater challenge than to make sure that every child—and all of us on this stage mean every child, not just a few children—every single child, regardless of where they live, how they’re raised, the income level of their family, every child receive a first-class education in America.” Although his pledge became the hope for improved education reform, effects have only been negative and contradictory to what they have promised.

Traditionally, educators have been held to some degree of expectation regarding student learning and increasing student aptitude; however, public expectations increased to a new level as a result of the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act [NCLB] (2002). NCLB was passed to ensure educational equity and increased academic achievement for all students. The legislation charged school district leaders with holding schools accountable for alignment with national and/or state standards that often mandated significant gains in student academic achievement, particularly for low-performing student populations, and that is measured by student performance on high-stakes tests. The test results created the data analyzed to design

Under the most current statewide mandates of the No Child Left behind Act (NCLBA) (Bush, 2001) educators in the public school system must raise the bar for teaching. This means teaching classroom lessons to effectively educate all styles of learning and bringing students to proficient levels of being educated. Schools are expected to meet these challenges by hiring qualified teachers who are well trained and educated to instruct daily assignments for students. In March of 2010, the Obama Administration sent to Congress a reform amendment of the public schools, NCLBA, to help close some achievement gaps. President Obama has called on Congress to fix the laws to benefit and prepare all students for college or career readiness.

Richards, we discussed how the teachers within our school study the data of each student. She explained that data needs to be collected for all interventions and that it is very important to have at least six to eight weeks of data. The intervention should have specific target skills and goals. Student goals should be created so that they can have quantifiable data. For example they should be written as “Jimmy will read 40 out of 46 sight words” instead of “Jimmy will increase his reading skills.” Also the goals should be created so that the target is something that is attainable in a six to eight week intervention period. Many teachers create an intervention binder or folder for their students to collect data in. The school district I am in uses a form that has the goal, skill, date of intervention, data of progress, and other components on it so that teachers use a uniform data sheet that can be understood by everyone (H. Richards, personal communication, March 16,

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) was put into effect January 8th 2002. The purpose of the Act was to create better education standards and close the racial/ethnic achievement gaps in schools. Achievement gaps occur when a group of students outperforms another group and the difference in average scores is statistically significant. Approximately eleven years later the aftermath of the Act has been examined in many journals and articles and criticized between students, teachers, and other administrators alike. There was much focus on the Act and its correlation between issues in high school dropout among minorities. In the National Journal for Publishing and Mentoring Doctoral Research the correlation between Minority Dropout in high school and NCLB was studied. In addition the largest criticism NCLB received was it’s strive to close the achievement gaps especially in minority students. In Race, inequality and educational accountability: The irony of ‘No Child Left Behind the unintended effects of the NCLB were made aware. Other news media outlets have disclosed the unresolved achievement gaps in school specifically among minority students in high school causing higher dropout rates than intended. In The New York Times an article was published disclosing statistic results of the NCLB. The negative effects of the No Child Left Behind Act seemed to triumph any of

Education has evolved over the years and special education has come a long way from where it began. However, there are still changes that are needed for special education. This paper gives an outlook on three major events in the history over the years and how it has shaped and changed special education. It also discusses the changes that still need to be made to continue to evolve.

This literature review seeks to explore the Every Student Succeeds Act (2015), a bipartisan reauthorization and revision to the No Child Left Behind Act (2002). The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) is the first law passed in fourteen years to address Reneeded changes to the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). Considered progressive and innovative at the time of its passage, NCLB was the most dramatic and aggressive legislation enacted in decades and afforded the federal government enormous oversight of schools in the U.S. Passage of ESSA represents a shift back to state governance of schools and, whether

Evidence of change is heavily supported by the many change initiatives the United States’ education system has seen in the past few years. There have been programs and initiatives that have been implemented and replaced, due to their ineffectiveness as a whole. Programs such as No Child Left behind (2002) were brought in as an initiative to assist schools with bridging the gap for students who had fell behind or schools who were falling behind; however, this initiative failed due to its one size fits all methodology. The NCLB initiative became too much for schools and school officials to implement effectively. Consequently, in 2015 the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) was created to fill the voids that were missing from NCLB. For example, NCLB accountability results were based on test scores alone, while ESSA focuses on multiple progress areas. ESSA provides a well-rounded education program for all students, regardless of their background or home environment. It includes more rigorous college and career readiness standards nationwide. These standards ensure that students nationwide are receiving the same information and skill sets. For example, the college and career readiness standards ensure that students are leaving grade school prepared to think critically, which will allow them to graduate from college or find a career outside of the college realm. NCLB lacked this foundation. The basis for which schools are assessed fall under many components, rather than just

In 2002, The United States Legislature passed the No Child Left Behind Act. The negative connotations of this act has pervaded our failing school system now for fourteen years. Students, parents, and teachers alike have all grown a resentment for the idea that, despite the effort, a student has the opportunity to fail, parents have the opportunity to bear witness to that failure, and teachers hold the considerable weight of believing it is due to their inadequacy. Individuals who possess the potential for something better are squandered and placed in the general education system that any academically unprepared adolescent can comprehend. The process of moving every child along through the twelve years that they are forced to endure the

“In 2002, the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law was the first to mandate nationwide testing at various grade levels” (Breiner, 2015). Since then, summative tests have been used to assess the achievement of students and increase accountability for both the schools and teachers (Kubiszyn & Borich, 2013, p. 15-25). These summative tests, also referred to as high-stakes tests, are given annually to students in third to ninth grade in language arts, math, and reading (Roach, 2014; Shepard, 2003). There are critics stating that teachers are only teaching to these high-stakes tests, implying that there is no real learning improvement, as well as those who are for and against conducting high-stakes testing.

At the onset of course study, I identified a course goal to pursue through the study sessions. That initial goal was to improve in the area of collecting data about my students in order to guide my attempt at differentiated instruction. To determine if I succeeded in my course goal, I cited the need to implement and practice key concepts presented during the course. The purpose of collecting both types of data (student and teacher) was to juxtapose the measurable data and use the information to identify differentiated instruction techniques which suited my style of teaching and my teaching situation. Based on the outcomes of practicing differentiated instruction within my classroom, I determined that the most important considerations a teacher

If student achievement is the goal and that goal is measured by standards-based assessments, the curriculum, instruction, and assessment must be aligned with the standards. If there is a disconnect among these elements, student achievement will not be evident. Alignment is an onging process as standards, curriculum, and assessments cycle through improvements. Fourth is data analysis. Instructional leaders must understand that having a current and ongoing look at data analysis is also important to the decision making process of determining the most effective instructional strategies to use in classrooms. An analysis of data also helps the leader to coach teachers on grouping arrangements and pinpoint specific student intervention needs. Fifth, Effective instructional leaders understand the necssaity of

When providing the class with questions it is important to remember that open-ended questions anticipate lengthy responses as opposed to closed questions. Although, guided instruction occurs in the form of questioning it is worthy to mention that a cue or a prompt can be conveyed as a question as well. Therefore, a cue or