No Child Left Behind might be left behind!

If you have not read Mark's blog today, you should!

Arne Duncan is talking about No Child Left Behind, and though he is not quite saying what I would want to hear (No Child Left Behind is a failed policy, an albatross around our necks, needs to be scrapped, etc.) he is saying that in a Washington savvy kind of way, perhaps. 

No Child Left Behind needs to be re-branded. Maybe even revised, rewritten. That sounds like new policy potentially. That would be good. Potentially. WE need to get involved. 

What role does the federal government play in education anyway? How does it impact state and local education agencies? Besides mandating education for all children, including children of color, Native American children, and children with disabilities, federal regulations define how money is spent in education. 

No Child Left Behind  also regulated curriculum through departments like Reading First, that controlled what curricula could be purchased and used in schools. Reading First has bordered on scandal, with accusations that officers took kickbacks and prevented fair competition among publishers. 

Reading First is an illustration of what is wrong with No Child Left Behind and educational policy in our current era. It is publisher focused, that is,  a business enterprise, driven by business people who see the world as a market place in which problems are solved by buying and selling things. Not that there is anything wrong with that. 

But it just may raise the wrong set of questions. 

Maybe it is time to stop talking about NCLB altogether and decide what conversation we want to have going forward. Let's talk about a new vision for education, and leave the old brand behind completely. We don't need a new brand for an old corporation, we need a whole new model of business, I mean, school. 

Reform what?

With President Elect Obama nominating Mr. Duncan to become the new secretary of education, everyone seems to be talking about reform. I would like to know more about what reforms he thinks are needed, because in education there are reform movements that seek to reform the previous reform movement. Ask any teacher. They will tell you that the trend in education is reform-- always reform. And the pendulum never slows, it simply gathers energy and swings wildly from one side of the pendulum to the other. Duncan has never been a teacher, so as a reformer it may be hard for him to get a sense of how hard this swing is for teachers to manage. 

Working as a teacher and teacher educator for many years, I have learned that it takes time for teachers to learn-- not surprising. They are after all, human like the rest of us and need time to practice complex things in varying conditions. I have seen reforms come in under one principal, with enormous amounts of effort and money following, only to be swept away after a year or two by a new administrator, new board, new idea. And the reform that had just begun to flourish is buried under some contrary idea. 

What I would say to Mr. Duncan and Mr. Obama is this: be smarter than the previous guys who did this. Don't throw out the baby with the bath water. Look not only at what has not worked, but what is working. Scale up what is working. Keep listening to all sides, get the big perspective. Use the really great work that the Institute for Educational Sciences (IES) has done to research what works. 

The biggest problem with No Child Left Behind is that it has turned our schools into dreary places where "reformers" come in and make sure every teacher is "covering material" at the same time, lockstep, documenting those who are not on the pacing guide-- even when they slow down to make sure their students are learning. Many teachers have left schools because, as one told me, I was being asked to do things to my students that I felt were wrong. One teacher explained that the "reform" consultant who came to their school suggested that they stop teaching writing until reading scores came up. WHAT? 

That is not reformed education, it is deformed. 

Talent matters in education, Duncan said. I could not agree more. He should start by looking inside our own country at some of the best and brightest that are here, doing good work that has nearly been shut down under My Child Left Behind.