The No Child Left Behind

With the added pressure to do well in school, standardized testing becomes a means to added stress, anxiety and further complicates the pressure to succeed in a student’s life. Rather than a focus on learning and understanding, school has become a massive rope skill memorization test designed to have students memorize subjects to pass the test, and forget the material the next minute for the next test. When asked to speak about standardized testing, education chairman, Larry Taylor, said “It’s heart-wrenching, and it’s also insanity when you see the level of achievement these kids are already doing and yet they can’t even pass this test.” (Smith). The utilization of standardized testing further exemplifies and validates the idea that no matter how hard or long you work in school, your work will never be worth the few answers you write for the

To many students standardized testing has become another part of schooling that is dreaded. Standardized testing has been a part of school since the nineteen-thirties; in those days it was used as a way to measure students that had special needs. Since the time that standardized test have been in American schools there has been many programs that have placed an importance on the idea of standardized testing such as the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (Evans 1). Over the years the importance of standardized testing has increased tremendously and so has the stakes, not only for teachers but also students. All states in the United States of America have state test in order to measure how much students learn, and help tell how well the

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 purpose of this paper is to address the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) which was signed into law by President Barack Obama in December 10, 2015. The paper will also address the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) which was signed into law by President George W. Bush in 2002. The paper will talk about some of the key components of ESSA in comparison with NCLB and identify some possible strengths and weaknesses in ESSA’s new approach.

When assessing educational legislation and whether it is good or bad law can be muddled by the fact that some part of the law is good versus some being bad. Also, the passing of time can change the viewpoint of such legislation. For instance, the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) was largely accepted as a good piece of legislation when the law was enacted, but with the passing of time, we have seen that the NCLB has its problems. The lack of truly funding the legislation, coupled with the fact that standardized testing given to each student, regardless of disability or English as a second language (ESL) status causes issues within some areas of the education system. Even so, there are still parts of the NCLB that are good for education as a

What once began as a simple test administered to students yearly to measure understanding of a particular subject has, as Kohn (2000) has stated, “Mutated, like a creature in one of those old horror movies, to the point that it now threatens to swallow our schools whole” (p.1). Today’s students are tested to an extent that is unparalleled in not only the history of our schools, but to the rest of the world as well. Step into any public school classroom across the United States and it will seem as if standardized testing has taken over the curriculum. Day after day teachers stress the importance of being prepared for the upcoming test. Schools spend millions of dollars purchasing the best test preparation materials, sometimes comes at the cost of other important material. Although test

“We will not tire, we will not falter, and we will not fail,” is a quote said by former president, George W. Bush, in his address to a joint session of Congress after the September eleventh attacks. The beginning of the twenty-first century marked a start of a revolution. A revolution of social change and global peace. The 2000’s is a decade of advanced technology, new and improved adjustments, and a decade of remembrance.

As far as learning for standardized testing goes there is a federal act involved that plays a role in the educational system and controls how the educational system teaches and tests these students. This act is named, The No Child Left Behind Act. This act makes standardized assessments mandatory for all fifty states. This law serves a purpose to test students in reading and math for grades three through eight. In high school, students are required to test and they are expected to meet or exceed state standards in reading and math. (Elementary and Secondary Education Act) “The major focus of No Child Left Behind is to close student achievement gaps by providing all children with a fair, equal, and significant opportunity to obtain a high-quality education” (Elementary and Secondary Education Act). But since the early 2000s, has this act kept it promise or has the responsibility of this act been not meeting these standards? When this law was first placed, it was said that this act would make it possible for students in the United States to become proficient in math and reading by the year 2014. (National Council of Churches Committee on Public Education and Literacy) But, does this mean that every student in the U.S. will meet these expectations? The National Council of Churches Committee on Public Education and Literacy does not believe so. “The No Child Left Behind Act sets an impossibly high bar—that every single student will be proficient in reading and math by 2014. We

The idea of the no child left behind act also known as NCLB was establish and signed into law on January 8, 2002 by former president George W. Bush which was actually supported by both of the political parties. The entire role of the No Child Left Behind act was to ensure the focus of American students to the better idea of getting the American educational system back into the competitive field internationally seeing that in the year 2002 the United States of America was actually ranked number eighteen out of the entire twenty four nations. The No Child Left Behind law has mad a huge break through Americas entire educational system. The NCLB law has given a much greater deal of attention to the way things are being done in the classroom and how it prepared for the classroom which is a important factor in bring America as a country to a much high number in the list of education throughout the world.

Tests, especially some standardized tests, not only make some students suffer from Neuro-psychentonia but also make teachers unable to handle the newly added knowledge in the tests that they even have not learned yet. Hence, truly effective standardized exams should test students’ understanding of the knowledge as well as their critical thinking instead of making standardized tests unreasonably tougher. And in order to buttress this perspective, the editor and publisher of The Nation Magazine: Katrina vanden Hevuel utilized many rhetorical appeals’ strategies to write her article “Stakes on standardized testing are too high,” which was published by The Washington Post. In the article, Hevuel displayed the uselessness and adverse aspects of improper standardized tests and emphasized her opinion that suitable and proper tests should truly focus on what students learned and how their teachers have been taught. Hevuel hopes her article can attract the attention of readers such as students, parents, and particularly educators and get their approval. Moreover, Hevuel

Imagine failing a test that alters the decisions made pertaining the future. Standardized tests are failing many schools that are serving disadvantaged children based on their knowledge on a test that is created in order to put upon higher standards for students. The No Child Left Behind Act is a law that had been signed by George W. Bush in pursuance to designate all public school students to perform standardized tests. The law had been signed in 2002 although, standardized testing had been popular and have been moving forward way before that time. Standardized testing has become very common in the United States. These tests had been set up in order to try to measure how much knowledge a student carries. Tests like STAR in California and

Have you ever felt the pressure of high-stakes testing as a student, a teacher, an administrator or even as a parent? The goals of federal and state governments of high stakes testing are to improve schools. The government believes if there are negative consequences tied to standardized test performance then teachers and students will work harder which will increase test scores. The use of standardized testing dates back several decades but with the passing of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) in 2002, high stakes testing is mandated nationwide. The article, High Stakes Testing and Student Achievement: Updated Analyses with NAEP Data, is a follow-up study about the relationship of high-stakes testing accountability and student achievement.

How could the idea of No Child Left Behind Act and standardized testing become such a terrible problem, that it has led to a generation of students that are not properly educated and prepared for college and the “Real World”? My Working thesis is that standardized testing should be removed from the school system because it is not testing what children know but teaching them how to test.

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.

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.