Back to Leave No Child Behind

The first part is true; the second part isn't. There are many people in other fields who are interested in teaching. Understandable, it's a profession that directly contributes to society, can be very satisfying, and provides a good deal of mental stimulation in a society where so many jobs are absolutely mind-numbing. The reason for the five-year burnout average, however, is primarily the result of low pay, overcrowded classrooms (and don't compare apples to oranges by bringing up Japanese classrooms), and lack of instructional resources. Disruptive students are annoying, but most teachers don't quit because of them (the overcrowded classrooms and lack of instructional resources, after all, help create the environment that fosters behavioral problems in the classroom). In addition, Students with severe mental handicaps and IQs as low as you've mentioned are not mainstreamed in most school districts across the country, nor are the severely emotionally/behaviorally impaired--they spend their days in self-contained classrooms with special education teachers. Teachers burn out because teaching is one of the lowest paying professions vis-a-vis required level of education, they have to spend hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars a year out of their own pockets for necessary educational materials and office supplies so they can properly do their job (we do, however, get to claim a whopping $250 of such expenses on our taxes), and the large class sizes create many problems--it increases our work load (though not our monetary compensation), behavioral problems increase exponentially with class size, and it prevents us from adequately meeting the educational needs of our students because there just isn't any more time. These issues, by the way, are not addressed by NCLB.

There also seems to be confusion about how standardized tests work. Half the scores on any test would, by definition, be at or below the median just as half would be at or above the median--that's what the median is: the score in the middle. All states set a minimum passing score on their tests and, in most states, most of the students who take the test meet or exceed the minimum passing score. At the individual high school level, however, performance on these tests most closely correlates with the predominate socioeconomic status of the students and the community. It is a very simple fact that socio-economics and educational achievement tend to go hand in hand. Students from higher income homes tend to do better than students from lower income homes. Schools in wealthier areas tend to be more successful than schools in poorer areas. It unfortunate that increased funding didn't substantially alleviate the problems of the school you mention in your anecdote (perhaps the money was misused or there are other factors that needed to be addressed but weren't), however, it is the case that better funded schools tend to produce better educated students. They simply have more resources to make this happen.

I am confused, however, about what a "good" voucher system looks like and how we go about setting one up. The voucher systems that have been proposed would, for the most part, do nothing more than subsidize the education of those who need the subsidy least: the upper middle class and the upper class. The best and most prestigious private schools would still cater almost exclusively to the wealthy, and even the lower end private schools would be out of reach for many in the poor and working classes because of transportation issues. The public education system would suffer greater budgetary strains because virtually every voucher plan that has been put forth would be funded by its state's general education fund. The reason this hurts public education is because all of those students who are already attending private schools (a minority of students, but not an insubstantial one) would suddenly have their educations partially or wholly subsidized by the state's education fund. This reduces funds available for public schools and further exasperates the problems they face.

I don't dismiss the potential for success of a well conceived voucher plan; the problem is that there haven't been any plans put forth that do anything more than subsidize the educations of a small portion of students whose families can already afford to send them to private school. So far, the voucher plans that have been proposed seem designed to do only two things: distribute wealth upwards to the wealthy and privatize education.

Mills, Thanks for putting forth your first hand perspective on education. I can only argue to the generalities from my reading of the problems we are having with NCLB. Your opinions about vouchers as they stand today leaves me to think it isn't working. A voucher system would also require that the favored schools would need to limit their enrollment. Logistics is aa big problem for any voucher system. Finally, it's my opinion that a preschool system established for all children will benefit our children the most.

C.I.: vouchers might work, but only if educational funding is greatly enhanced (which most people seem unwilling to do now), transportation is provided, and schools accepting vouchers would have to be willing to accept vouchers as total payment from students whose families cannot afford to pay more, suffer governmental oversight to ensure that their admissions policies are fair (something most private schools seem unwilling to tolerate), and a system of publically-funded tutoring would have to be set up for economically disadvantaged students so they could compete with students from economically advantaged families who already enjoy greater educational opportunities and preparation.

All told, a 'good' voucher system would cost more than an adequately funded reformed public school system. (And then we could get into the fact that most private school teachers do not meet NCLB's "highly qualified teacher" criteria...)

Mills, I defer to your opinion about vouchers, because I don't have personal knowledge about all the pros and cons on this issue. Thanks for sharing your ideas. As you say, without the funding, I'm not sure how realistic to be thinking about any voucher system at this time.

C.I.: I would like to see sincere attempts at educational reform on the part of our political leaders. I haven't yet, but I would like to. The biggest potential advantage of a voucher system seems to be that it addresses the problems of our "one size fits all" public education system. However, most private schools are modeled after public schools, except they tend to have less qualified teachers (many don't have college degrees or teaching certifications--this tends to be true nationally, but does vary by state) and a less diverse curriculum. The reason private school students succeed is the same reason most successful public school students succeed--they have parents with the time and resources to take an active role in their education.

Many school districts have begun implementing magnet school programs. What this does is provide qualifying students with an educational niche where they may explore their interests while still learning the necessary basics. These magnet programs usually break down into humanities, performing and fine arts, math and science, and technology/vocational depending on the size and/or funding of the school district with the program. This seems to have real potential for reforming education, but the funding just isn't there to make the programs more widely available.

Mills, Our family was unusual in the fact that our mother did not take an active roll in our education, but my older brother ended up becoming an attorney, and later became an administrative judge in California. My younger brother is an ophthalmologist with an MBA, and is now a legislator in California. Our sister is an RN, but I admire what she was able to accomplish. Her two oldest are physicians, the third is a dentist, and the youngest is attending/teaching at UCLA. My wife did very well in school with honors from high school, nursing school and college. Our older son graduated with honors from undergrad and graduate studies. I've always been on the bottom of the totem poll (and black sheep) in our family, but I think the "happiest."

Mills 75- I am very much afraid that you have been misinformed. It is my opinion that your ideas on education do not conform to the evidence.

First of all, the point I made about teachers dropping out of the profession in the early years is backed up by documentation.

According to New Dropouts--see http://www.unc.edu/~wdevane/paper.html

Thirty Per Cent of new teachers leave after two years and 62% leave within 5 years. If you have other documentation, I would appeciate it if you provide it.

Mills 75-You also appear to be out of touch with the procedures involved in setting medians for tests. A publishing company will give 10,000 fifth grade children a test when they are attempting to set up a new measurement. The mode in the test or, as some would say, the most frequent score makes the score that fifth graders should receive in order to score at the end of the fifth grade level.

You do not appear to understand the simple idea that, in any large scale test, half the people will score below the median and half above the median. There will always be children who are scoring below the median by definition.


The old shibboleth about funding has been shown to be nonsense. Funding is not the magic bullet and, in fact, has been shown to be subsidary to cultural influences.

In the Kansas City Schools in the eighties, federal jiudges in Kansas decreed that the city schools would be receiving funds and STUDENTS from the suburbs of Kansas City. The Kansas city schools received MORE money than any school system has ever received. The experiment lasted nearly ten years. THE STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT DID NOT RISE AT ALL AND REMAINED AT THE LEVELS OF FORMER YEARS. This is only one of the instances which proves that funding is not a primary force in funding.

People who know little about education are fond of declaring that Socio-Economics is the force which holds down the learning process. They are incorrect unless they include culture as part of socio-economics.

The renown columnist and writer< Thomas Sowell, tells of Asian students whose familiy incomes are below the poverty line, scoring, AS A GROUP, higher than Black and HIspanic students whose families made more than $50,000 a year. Sowell indicates that such evidence shows that culture is far more important than family finances in causing scholastic achievement.

Many do not appear to understand the Voucher movement in this country.

First of all, Schools supported by vouchers are NOT primarily attended by the Middle Class but rather those close to or below the poverty line.

Secondly, a voucher school which can serve inner city students and accepts all students except the highly disruptive (about 5%) and the severely mentally handicapped( about 5%) will do quite well since the teacher who has a class which contains the disruptive and the mentally handicapped MUST spend a great deal of time with only 10% of her class to the eventual detrement of the regular students.

"Teaching to the test" does not have to be training monkeys. Teachers don't have the test in front of them and don't know what the specific questions will be. But we know what the students are going to have to know to pass it. What it forces teachers to do is to actually teach instead of pretending to teach. And the kids actually are learning something.

Information learned by rote is also not useless information. Memorizing the multiplication tables, theorums, passages of poetry, dates, names, places are all useful to teach children how to organize and retain information, how to discipline their minds, and it gives them confidence. Once they can organize information in their heads and learn how to focus, they can be taught how to think instead of what to think. And by that time they are so intrigued by the process and hungry for more that it takes a good teacher to keep up with them.

More funding is not the answer to correct the nation's schools. We already spend more per capita than most other countries, and the worst schools generally are receiving more funding per capita than some of the best schools. Private schools with little or no government funding are overall producing better results than public schools. Home schooled kids with no funding are doing the best of all.

To me the answer is in a complete cultural shift. Start with being realistic about the learning process. Get Title I out of the schools and make it its own thing targeted to the special ed kids who can't make it in the public schools. As long as we create the illusion that kids benefit from being mainstreamed, Title I will continue to siphon off resources and leaving the 'normal kids' seriously shortchanged.

Develop a core curriculum of what kids have to know in order to be considered educated, make it challenging enough to be important, and make it time consuming enough that schools have to spend their time teaching it instead of wasting so many precious hours every week on non-educational activities. Include room for fine arts, music, theater, sports because it is undeniable that children who participate in such things do better academically than those who do not.

Put the emphasis and pressure back on the parents. Make them understand that if they want their child to be educated in the mainstream public schools, the child is going to have to raise abilities to a minimum standard and the parents need to be interested, involved, and hands on in that process. No longer will the schools be a gigantic network of babysitting institutions. If the child is not able to cut it in the mainstream schools, then then parents will need to find alternate means of educating the child or perhaps an alternate trade school environment for problem students could be established. There is no justification for penalizing the conscientious good student to accommodate those who cannot or will not learn.

And then implement the voucher program. If parents are given the option to place their children in the very best schools, they are likely to excercise that option. When that happens all the schools will be competing to be the very best and how can the students not benefit from a scenario like that? What good teacher would not want to be part of it?

Apr 6, 4:05 AM EDT

U.S. to Change No Child Left Behind Law

By BEN FELLER
AP Education Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A fundamental change in how the Education Department enforces the No Child Left Behind law could affect the education of millions of students as states seek federal approval on everything from teacher quality to the measuring of student progress.

For example, the department plans to give certain states more freedom in how they test hundreds of thousands of children with milder disabilities, Bush administration officials told The Associated Press on Tuesday. Only states that can prove progress or a strong commitment to improve will be seriously considered for that flexibility, the officials said.

The idea is to get something in return for offering such flexibility, said one official familiar with the changes, such as increased learning and "narrowing the achievement gap." Shrinking the test-score gap between white and minority students is a central goal of the 2001 law, which aims to get all children to grade level in reading and math by 2014.

The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because the policies had not been formally announced. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings has invited top school officers from the states to Mount Vernon, Va., on Thursday to unveil the enforcement approach and the special education policy. Education Department leaders declined comment until then.


The new enforcement approach is the first significant change under Spellings, who helped write the law as Bush's domestic policy chief in the White House before becoming secretary in January.

Spellings has determined that the Education Department hasn't focused enough on the big picture - whether students are learning - when it reviews and approves state education plans. States must get approval if they want changes in how they hold schools accountable.

As examples, the department now plans closer review the states' progress in graduating students, showing gains in early reading and providing report cards to the public.

"If they're going to judge states' efforts on meeting the intent of No Child Left Behind, then I think it's going to be a great move and something everyone will be in support of," said Scott Young, senior policy specialist for the National Conference of State Legislatures. "It would put more focus on results, not on making sure states comply with certain regulation.


The bipartisan conference of state lawmakers has criticized the Bush administration over the law, calling it a coercive act that sets unrealistic goals for some hard-to-reach students. One state, Connecticut, became the first on Tuesday to pledge a federal lawsuit over the law.

Yet the department's plans to give states different treatment based on good behavior raise political and legal questions, said Patricia Sullivan, director of the independent Center on Education Policy. Administration officials said lawyers have cleared the idea.

"Who is going to decide whether you have a different level of commitment than another state?" Sullivan said. "Will it matter whether you're a red or blue state? Will it matter whether you have something pending in your state legislature to send the federal money back?"

On the special education policy, the department already allows schools to test 1 percent of students - those with significant cognitive disabilities - at their instructional level rather than their grade level. That has been the only testing exception.

Now the department will also allow flexibility for students who are not severely disabled but who have not been able to reach grade level because of disabilities such as moderate mental retardation or severe emotional disabilities. Schools will be allowed to give alternate tests for an additional 2 percent of kids, aimed at covering these "gap" students.

The tests may be geared toward grade-level content but presented in a different way, or they may be based on a different academic level deemed appropriate for an individual student. The department will be looking for models that ensure progress and align tests to content.

Put together, the change means 3 percent of all children - that's roughly 30 percent of all children with disabilities - will be allowed to be tested on standards geared for them.

States have been clamoring for that flexibility. But several advocacy groups for the disabled are angry about the change, saying it weakens the promise to leave no child behind.

"It doesn't make sense to decide there is a group of kids who will never make grade level," said Ricki Sabia, associate director of the National Down Syndrome Society Policy Center. "We hold great exception to that concept."

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On The Net:

Education Department: http://www.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml

http://staging.hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EDUCATION_SHAKE_UP?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-04-06-04-05-26

[edited because I reread it again. On second reading I see this is not something that is going to take away money based on test scores but just to give flexiblity which I think is a good thing. I am between moderate and severe hard of hearing and I wish that more could have been done on a more universal level in regards to meeting the special needs of those with moderate disabiliities. Also this bill seems to be something to help those with disabilities meet those awful test that Bush set up. )

This site backs what I said 100%. Perhaps you should reread my post more carefully. I never disagreed with the burnout rate you cited (I'm a teacher, I know the burnout rate--I've only got three years in at the district I work for, but I have more seniority than over two-thirds of my colleagues).

You cited student behavior as the primary reason for teacher dissatisfaction/high burnout rate (a fact not supported by the link you provided) and I disagreed citing low salary as the primary reason (a fact that is supported by the link you provided). I also listed overcrowded classrooms and limited resources as contributing factors of burnout (the total list of contributing factors is quite long).

Mills 75--You may have noticed that you agreed with my first statement but challenged my second one in which I said:
"Many people leave because of terrible teaching conditions"

I stand by that and will offer evidence that "money" is not the primary reasons why teachers quit.

An educational testing company either designs the tests to the state's specifications or the state chooses a test the company has already created. In either event, it is the state that sets the passing grade, not the educational testing company.


Was I somehow unclear about the definition of 'median'?



Is funding the only factor governing educational success? No. However, no credible educational scholar rejects the fact that it's a very important factor.


I seem to recall you refuting C.I.'s post for his use of anecdotes to support his case. Do anecdotes mystically gain greater statistical generalizability when you employ them?


And people who know nothing of education, except what right-wing idealogues program into their brains, are always quick to assert that money doesn't matter. (What the hell? If it doesn't matter, then there's no good reason not to equalize funding among schools.)


Renowned only in some circles--this Friedman fellow at the conservative Hoover Institute is one of the Right's favorite token minorities (though his attack on The Bell Curve demonstrates that he isn't a complete jackass). No one argues that culture isn't a factor, but broader sociological trends are screaming "It's the economics, stupid!"


Since vouchers are currently in use in only a few states, this amounts to little more than anecdotal evidence. However, private schools generally (nationwide) tend to cater to the middle and upper classes. If vouchers became a nationwide program, these are the institutions that, along with their students' predominantly middle and upper class families, will become the primary beneficiaries of the voucher system.


There aren't enough private schools in most urban areas to accomodate 90% of the students. Removing the most disruptive students (as I've stated previously, students with severe mental handicaps are not in regular education classrooms) would make classroom management much easier and it would free up much of the teacher's attention for the rest of the class; however, how are private schools receiving vouchers going to recruit and maintain qualified teachers considering they tend to pay teachers much, much less than public schools, which already aren't paying teachers enough?

Mills, I believe we are arguing with someone that doesn't understand much about education. He seems to emphasize four areas, 1) median scores, 2) culture, 3) vouchers, and 4) money with different degrees of influence. He uses Sowell as his primary source which only reflects past performance and history, while the reality must look at the future of our educational system as a whole. He seems to ignore recent media articles such as the fact that more minorities are dropping out of school - even in (relavtively) high achieving districts. He has absolutely no clue except for his repeated mantra of the four issues he seems to rely on to improve our educational system. His mind-set will not change, and any attempt at discussion on this topic is a waste of time.

BTW, one of the San Jose school districts is laying off over 200 teachers from lack of funding. Vouchers aren't going to help them one iota.

My daughter is going into special education, I only hope the funds and the will to fund will still be there when she graduates. She gets her associates before too long and I am proud of her for going into teaching. Oddly enough my other daughter is going to be an occupational therapist, I hope the economy is good enough for there to be a need for that too. Sometimes it seems kids today are going to school for an iffy situation with the bad domestic economy and wars. I think the problem is that these kinds of careers are slowly being weeded out and I don't believe that it is happening by accident.

(though the last is only a vague personal impression)

revel, I'm glad to hear there are still people interested in the educational field in an environment that doesn't seem to show much respect for teachers. In my earlier post, I mentioned the fact that a school district in San Jose is laying off over 200 teachers, but there's more to the story. What happened was that the district sent out lay off notices to over 700 teachers - an overkill. What they accomplished was to demoralize the teachers to threaten them with their jobs. The administration of many school districts do not use the brains they are supposed to have; teachers with over 20 years of experience received those lay off notices, and they were really upset not knowing whether they will still have their jobs. But enough of my ranting. As for your daughter going into occupational therapy should have more opportunities for employment. When I worked for a nonprofit agency providing services to the developmentally disabled, we used occupational therapists to help the clients to prepare them for jobs in industry and fast food restaurants. It's one area your daughter might consider.

"Laying off 200 teachers..." Maybe I should talk to my oldest daughter about another career. But she really likes it so far when she goes on those observational class things and she was late in getting started and is only now catching up. I hate for her to have change majors now.

(I have two and it was the younger one who is going into occupational therapy and the older one is going into special ED.)

But enough on this subject, didn't mean to turn it into me, I could just identify with it.

Did you say the school was a private school? Are the public ones having funding problems? I almost think that is obvious question, but just want to make sure and not assume it is true.

The school is San Jose is a public school.

revel, Here's part of the article from the SJ Merc.
"Posted on Wed, Apr. 06, 2005





463 teacher pink slips withdrawn

WARNINGS SPURRED BY BUDGET SHORTFALL

By Jon Fortt

Mercury News


Relief is on the way for 463 of the 788 teachers who received layoff warnings from East Side Union High School District last month: They should soon receive assurance that their jobs are safe.

Human resources chief Bob Nunez said hundreds more teachers should also have their warnings rescinded once administrators and teachers union officials agree on the criteria the district can use to exempt teachers. Administrators want to automatically safeguard teachers in high-demand subjects such as English, math and science.

Santa Clara County's second-largest school district has been grappling with a projected budget shortfall of about $10 million next school year, and has already cut district office staff and other budgets. Administrators, most of whom are new to the district, also have been pressuring the East Side's veteran teachers to accept a pay cut."