I am interested in a truly balanced assesment of the No Child Left
Behind Act. Both in terms of concrete progress that has been made/not
made, progress that will/will not likely result due to the changes
required by the act, as well as problems or deficiencies in the act
which are or will likely cause difficulty in achieving the results. I
have read a fair amount on the subject but there seems to only be two
polar opposite views of the act (must be an election year...) I am not
interested in the politics of the act! I want to know the real story
preferably in quantitative information rather than expert opinions of
what might happen. Anyway, sorry for the low $ but it is only a
personal question and thats still a lot for me... Thanks!

Mike

I don't have any data for an overall assessment, but here is one
example of how it has impacted our school district.....

I live in a very high-achieving suburban school district that by every
previous state measure was excellent.  Our schools didn't pass one
measure of the "No Child Left Behind" Act, which was how much progress
troubled students were making.

Many people in our district were "angry" with the results.  I thought
the Act was doing exactly as intended.  Even though we're great at
educating the high achieving students, we truly can't be defined as
excellent unless we can make a difference for the struggling students
as well.

No Child Left Behind opened my eyes.  I don't know if this type of
issue was all that the Act was intended to address, but in my opinion
it's aiming for the right things.

happytobeme

Thanks for the comment Happy... I think many people of high
socioeconomic status are not happy with NCLB because I think NCLB was
designed to create a bottom level of minimum achievement that there
would be no exceptions for missing. Many types of kids are going to do
well no matter what school they are in, however statistics I have read
such as only 40% of 4th graders in the US can read at the 4th grade
level make it pretty clear to me that our educational system was not
designed to ensure ALL sudents were educated to a minimum standard.
(Which by the way is far below what many of us on the internet might
deem OK for our children, but isn't that the point?) Anyway, thanks
for the comment and I would love a non-partisan researcher to take a
crack at it. Thanks!

Mike