Politics & Government
Massachusetts to Receive No Child Left Behind Waiver (POLL)
President Obama to free 10 states from law's requirements; Weston superintendent voices opinion.
President Barack Obama announced yesterday he will free 10 states, including Massachusetts, from the "strict and sweeping" requirements of the controversial No Child Left Behind law, according to The Associated Press.
Enacted a decade ago with widespread bipartisan support, No Child Left Behind requires all students to be proficient in reading and math by 2014. Its provisions require students to take a standardized test that determines if the school will receive Title I funding, based on whether the school has made Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP).
Though ostensibly designed to help the nation's poor and minority children, the law has consistently come under fire by critics who say the law is too rigid and has led to so-called "teaching to the test."
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With yesterday's announcement, states granted waivers from the law are freed from its original requirements, provided they offer a viable plan instead, says the AP story. Under Obama's deal, the states granted waivers must show they will prepare children for college and careers, set new targets for improving achievement among all students, reward the best performing schools and focus help on the ones doing the worst.
"The waiver will allow the state to focus on the most needy schools where the greatest number of children are challenged to reach 'proficient' or even 'needs improvement' on the MCAS," Weston Superintendent of Schools Cheryl Maloney said in an email. "Since the passage of NCLB, the closer schools get to 100% proficient, the harder it is to make “adequate yearly progress” with all sub groups. This has resulted in a large number of Massachusetts schools being cited, which the federal government and the DESE realized was counterproductive.
Find out what's happening in Westonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
"We will continue to work with all of our students in grades 3-10 so that they can meet the MCAS benchmarks of Proficient and Advanced," she added.
According to the Associated Press, the first 10 states to receive the waivers are Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Oklahoma and Tennessee, with a total of 28 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico also planning to seek to seek waivers.
