Obama Offers States An Alternative To No Child Left Behind

With Congress making little progress toward revamping the controversial No Child Left Behind law, President Barack Obama announced on Friday that states will now have more flexibility in meeting the legislation’s stringent requirements, including ensuring all students are proficient in reading and math by 2014, by applying for a waiver.

Under the No Child Left Behind law, a school’s success rate is based largely on how well students perform on standardized tests. Schools are expected to have an increase in scores each year. Those schools that do not meet performance standards are labeled as failures and face closure or a turnover of leadership to private entities, and risk federal funding. The waiver will change all of that.

Schools that do not meet achievement standards set by No Child Left Behind will no longer be considered as failing if the states apply for and receive a waiver nor will states be required to give those low-performing schools a set amount of federal money each year.

However, states will still be required to create a plan that clearly defines how they are going to ensure progress is made at low-performing schools. Quick to head off any criticism, President Obama asserts that states that receive waivers will actually need to have even higher standards.

“The change we’re making is not lowering standards; we’re saying we’re going to give you more flexibility to meet high standards. We’re going to let states, schools and teachers come up with innovative ways to give our children the skills they need to compete for the jobs of the future,” President Obama said.

States will have to meet strict criteria to receive a waiver. In addition to providing a detailed plan of how they will turnaround underperforming schools, states will be required to establish a method of evaluating each school’s principals and teachers.

In addition, schools will have to create standards that will ensure that all students are career or college ready by the time they graduate from high school and develop reforms to make sure all teachers and school leaders are able to do their jobs effectively.