According to published reports, many school systems are evaluating the effectiveness of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (Public Law 107-110), which was passed by Congress. The No Child Left Behind Act, commonly known as NCLB, is a federal law that reauthorizes a number of federal programs that aim to improve the performance of primary and secondary schools. NCLB proposes to do this by increasing the standards of accountability for states, school districts and schools, as well as providing parents more flexibility in choosing which schools their children will attend.

Supporters of NCLB claim the legislation encourages accountability in public schools, offers parents greater educational options for their children, and helps close the achievement gap between minority and white students. NCLB aims to achieve these goals through federally mandated standardized testing, a controversial method of measuring educational outcomes. In addition, some have argued that local government had failed students, necessitating federal intervention to prevent issues like teachers teaching outside their areas of expertise, and complacency in the face of continually failing schools.

Those who are critical of the NCLB legislation, particularly officials in some state public schools systems argue that the bill is “cookie cutter” legislation that isn’t compatible with singular issues specific to local school systems across the country. Further, they contend that the bill is not fully funded in many school systems, there continue to be problems with creating and administering standardized testing, inequitable division of resources and limitations of local control, among other reported concerns.

While federal officials have said that states that don't comply with the bill could lose federal funding, more than a dozen states have recently debated against embracing the bill that mandated frequent testing and set strict, uniform achievement standards for schools. Refusal to comply with “No Child Left Behind” legislation would place many school systems, particularly urban schools in a quandary since loss of federal dollars would largely affect low-income schools that get the bulk of federal dollars.

While the intent of No Child Left behind was to ultimately close the achievement gap among our children, there is continued debate regarding its overall intent and effectiveness. What do you think?