New Education Law Returns Education Policy to States, Ignores Equity as Federal Priority
Yesterday the Senate passed the Every Student Succeeds Act, the newest example of pretending that reality will match a bill title’s rhetoric. We have turned the corner from the negative No Child Left Behind to the positive Every Student Succeeds, but what Congress just passed will definitely not ensure that every student succeeds.
The new law passed after years’ and years’ of trying (Reauthorizations were attempted without any consensus reached in 2007, 2010, and 2013.) leaves the machinery of test-and-punish pretty much in place. The bill keeps the testing, and it says that states must do something to “turnaround” the bottom-scoring schools. What to do is left up to the states. One positive is that there is no longer a federal mandate to rank and rate teachers using students’ test scores.
Last week after the House vote to affirm the Every Child Succeeds Act, Jeff Bryant at the Educational Opportunity Network wrote, Go Ahead, Pass Every Student Succeeds Act, But Don’t Celebrate It. That sums things up pretty well.
Here is a very quick, broad-stroke summary of what this over-a-thousand-page bill will do. In it Congress mandates that schools test students in grades 3-8 and once in high school. States are still required to disaggregate the data and rate and rank schools based on students’ test scores. States are required to consider other factors beyond test scores in their ratings, but test scores must remain the most important factor. States are required to identify the lowest-New Education Law Returns Education Policy to States, Ignores Equity as Federal Priority | janresseger:
