COVID-19   Law    Advocacy    Topics A-Z     Training    Wrights' Blog   Wrightslaw Store    Yellow Pages for Kids 

Home > Doing Your Homework > Answering Questions About Support for NCLB by Sue Whitney


The Special Ed Advocate newsletter
It's Unique ... and Free!

Enter your email address below:

2024
Training Programs

Apr. 11 - Denver, CO

June 5-8 - San Antonio, TX

Sept. 24 - MD via ZOOM

Full Schedule


Wrightslaw

Home
Topics from A-Z
Free Newsletter
Seminars & Training
Yellow Pages for Kids
Press Room
FAQs
Sitemap

Books & Training

Wrightslaw Storesecure store lock
  Advocate's Store
  Student Bookstore
  Exam Copies
Training Center
Mail & Fax Orders

Advocacy Library

Articles
Cool Tools
Doing Your Homework
Ask the Advocate
FAQs
Newsletter Archives
Short Course Series
Success Stories
Tips

Law Library

Articles
Caselaw
Fed Court Complaints
IDEA 2004
McKinney-Vento Homeless
FERPA
Section 504

Topics

Advocacy
ADD/ADHD
Allergy/Anaphylaxis
American Indian
Assistive Technology
Autism Spectrum
Behavior & Discipline
Bullying
College/Continuing Ed
Damages
Discrimination
Due Process
Early Intervention
  (Part C)

Eligibility
Episodic, such as
   Allergies, Asthma,
   Diabetes, Epilepsy, etc

ESSA
ESY
Evaluations
FAPE
Flyers
Future Planning
Harassment
High-Stakes Tests
Homeless Children
IDEA 2004
Identification & Child Find
IEPs
Juvenile Justice
Law School & Clinics
Letters & Paper Trails
LRE / Inclusion
Mediation
Military / DOD
Parental Protections
PE and Adapted PE
Privacy & Records
Procedural Safeguards
Progress Monitoring
Reading
Related Services
Research Based
  Instruction

Response to Intervention
  (RTI)

Restraints / Seclusion
   and Abuse

Retention
Retaliation
School Report Cards
Section 504
Self-Advocacy
Teachers & Principals
Transition
Twice Exceptional (2e)
VA Special Education

Resources & Directories

Advocate's Bookstore
Advocacy Resources
Directories
  Disability Groups
  International
  State DOEs
  State PTIs
Free Flyers
Free Pubs
Free Newsletters
Legal & Advocacy
Glossaries
   Legal Terms
   Assessment Terms
Best School Websites

 

Answering Questions about Support for NCLB
by Sue Whitney, Research Editor, Wrightslaw

Print this page

**********

Note: Congress has reauthorized the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), the statute formerly known as No Child Left Behind. The new statute, Every Student Succeeds Act, was signed into law by President Obama on December 10, 2015.

**********

Dear Wrightslaw:

I have a question about your support for No Child Left Behind.
I find it hard to understand how you can support this legislation when some of the standards, such as the "4th grade reading level" are, it seems obvious to me, not possible for children with severe disabilities to achieve.

As a parent of children with disabilities who has been an advocate for many other families in a professional capacity for over 20 years, I have seen IEPs for some of these children with goals such as "to maintain respiration," or "to be able to grasp a toy."

With the 100% standard for accomplishment by 2014, including financial disincentives for noncompliance, what motivation will school districts have to keep serving these children, when the children's inability to reach these goals can cost the school district their funding? I fear that the subtle, and sometimes not-so-subtle pressure put on some families to take their children out of schools will only increase in this atmosphere.

As well, it also is pretty clear that NCLB was politically motivated by those with an agenda to further undermine the public school system. Unless you live in Lake Woebegone, no school district has children who are all "above average" When your schools can't achieve these impossibly high standards, the politicians will have all the ammunition they need to direct public funding away from the schools.

I have been a longtime user of your usually excellent advocacy advice, but I fail to see how uncritical acceptance of NCLB really furthers the cause of helping children with disabilities succeed in fulfilling their potential, or how it fits with other positions you have taken, such as on high Stakes Testing, since NCLB seems to be the ultimate High Stakes Test.

Sue Responds
I want to clarify a few things before I get to your fears for severely disabled children.

The "all" in NCLB means 95%. By 2014, 95% of children must be at the proficient level on state testing. Proficient does not mean above average. It just means that the child has mastered what his state has determined is grade level material. By federal definition, anything below proficient means the child has not mastered grade level work. (20 U. S. C. § 6311)

It will be a decade before we need to worry about whether the 95% factor is appropriate. Right now it would be a miracle for some schools to teach 40% of the kids.

Here are some facts about 12th graders from the 2002 Nation's Report Card:

Only 36 percent are proficient in reading
Only 18 percent are proficient in science
Only 17 percent are proficient in math
Only 11 percent are proficient in U. S. history
Source: U.S. Department of Education, The Nation's Report Card, 2002.

Up until now, schools continued to get federal money, whether they taught kids or not. Now we are requiring results in exchange for the money. As a taxpayer and a parent, that makes sense to me.

Now for your concerns about schools abandoning the children with the most severe disabilities.

No Child Left Behind is a general education law. Lowering the general education standards to will not help children with severe disabilities.

The U. S. Department of Education published a proposed regulation to allow schools to use alternative assessments for students with the most significant cognitive disabilities. (NCLB Regulations)

If IDEA is weakened in the next reauthorization though, your concerns for these children is well founded. Without IDEA to protect individual children there is absolutely nothing in any other education law to prevent schools from abandoning children who require expensive teaching and who will not reach grade level.

IDEA has been around long enough that many of us think of these protections as permanent. They are not. If we do not let our Congress people know how we feel about IDEA, we may not have these protections much longer.

Sue Whitney Heath
Research Editor

More articles by Sue:

A Parent's Guide to No Child Left Behind

No Child Left Behind: What Teachers, Principals & School Administrators Need to Know

10 Strategies to Fight Mandatory Retention & Other Damaging Policies

Exit Exams Can Be Optional - If You Plan Ahead

High Stakes! Can the School Use a Single Test to Retain My Child?



Meet Sue Whitney

Sue Whitney of Manchester, New Hampshire, works with families as a special education advocate and is the research editor for Wrightslaw.

In
Doing Your Homework, Suzanne Whitney gives savvy advice about reading, research based instruction, and creative strategies for using education standards to advocate for children and to improve public schools.

Her articles have been reprinted by SchwabLearning.org, EducationNews.org, Bridges4Kids.org, The Beacon: Journal of Special Education Law and Practice, the Schafer Autism Report, and have been used in CLE presentations to attorneys.

Sue is the co-author of Wrightslaw: No Child Left Behind (ISBN: 978-1-892320-12-4) that was published by Harbor House Law Press, Inc.

She also served on New Hampshire's Special Education State Advisory Committee on the Education of Students/Children with Disabilities (SAC).

Sue Whitney's bio.

Copyright © 2002-2022 by Suzanne Whitney.

Email Newsletter icon, E-mail Newsletter icon, Email List icon, E-mail List icon The Special Ed Advocate: It's Free!

March Sale - SAVE 25%

Print, Immediate Downloads
and Advocacy Supplies
Order Wrightslaw Product
s
and Save 25% Now!



Check Out
The Advocate's Store!

Wrightslaw on FacebookWrightslaw on TwitterWrightslaw YouTube Channel 

Wrightslaw Books
Wrightslaw: Special Education Law, 3rd Edition, by Pam and Pete Wright
About the Book

Wrightslaw: From Emotions to Advocacy, 2nd Edition
About the Book

Wrightslaw: All About IEPs
About the Book

Wrightslaw: All About Tests and Assessments
About the Book

Wrightslaw: Special Education Legal Developments and Cases 2019
About the Book

Surviving Due Process: Stephen Jeffers v. School Board
About the DVD Video


The Advocate's Store


Understanding Your Child's
Test Scores (1.5 hrs)

Wrightslaw Special: $14.95