No Child Left Behind Act, Is It Working in California? Research Paper Example

The No Child Left Behind Act is a law that came into effect on January 8, 2002. Political powers in Congress came together with President George Bush and approved an agreement to improve education opportunities for all American children, regardless of their background, ethnicity, location or income. The purpose of the Act was to facilitate all children to reach higher education standards though focusing on methods that have previously been proven to work effectively; however, there is current controversy on the effectiveness of the Act due to some states not performing up to the proposed standards. It has been recognized that some schools across the nation are in fact reaching the high achievement standards, even with a history of performing under the standards. This indicates that the Act is working for some schools. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the Act in its entirety and present the possible flaws or problems of the Act that may be affecting the States that are not achieving the proposed goals, particularly in the State of California. (The Office Under the Secretary 9; Schrag 1)

George Bush has described the No Child Left Behind Act as the cornerstone of his administration. He indicated that the children are the future and that too many of the needy children are left behind. Therefore, this Act was put into effect in order to help children achieve higher standards of education. There were several goals of the No Child Left Behind Act, such as to support learning during the early years of education in order to prevent learning difficulties at a later age, to provide more information to the parents about their child’s progress, to alert parents of important information on their child’s performance, to provide parents and children with the opportunity to transfer to higher achieving schools, to provide information to improve teaching and learning for the teachers, to ensure that teacher quality is a priority, and to provide more resources to schools. (U.S. Department of Education (a) 2-3) The question in this paper is therefore, how effective have these particular goals been reached in the State of California and is it the Act that is the problem, or is it the government officials in the state itself?

In the 2009-2010 Consolidated State Performance Report for the state of California Department of Education, the number of public elementary and secondary schools, charter schools and districts that made Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) was reported. Out of 9,857 schools, only 3,557 schools made AYP (38.3%). Out of 1021 districts, only 251 made AYP (24.6%). (U.S. Department of Education (b) 28) The AYP for schools that received federal funds was also reported. Only 197 schools out of 956 that received the funding made the AYP (20%). (U.S. Department of Education (b) 29) California then proposed to identify the specific areas that needed improvement and write corrective actions. The state approached this problem to intervene with local education agencies (LEAs) and write corrective action plans. For the 2010-2011 school years, only the LEAs were approved due to the recession. Here we see that the state of California is in fact trying to increase the percentages in their performance reports, but the budget is preventing this from happening. The corrective action plan had set some great criteria that could help improved their statistics, such as implementing a new curriculum based on the State standards, authorizing students to transfer from district schools to higher performing schools in a neighboring district, reduce administrative funds, replaced district personnel that were directly related to the failure in making the AYP, remove one or more schools from the district and restructure the districts. However, due to the recession, California has not been able to apply these corrective actions. (U.S. Department of Education (b) 32-33)

Going back to the goals of the No Child Left Behind Act, one of the goals was to support learning during the early years of education and to prevent learning difficulties at a later age. The problem with this is the implementing this type of support in California may be more difficult than other states due to immigration and minority backgrounds. It is known that school-age children of immigrants are highly concentrated in California. In fact in the year 2000, 47% of all elementary age children in the State of California were from parents who immigrated to the United States (Capps et al. 35). In addition, another study found that schools that were not meeting the achievement levels in California served 75-85% minority student populations; whereas, the schools that met the achievement levels served only 40% minority students (Knaus, 4). The No Child Left Behind Act can improve education for children of immigrants who are limited English proficient (LEP) and minority students through the Title I and Title III of the Act. This requires the schools in improve the performance of the students starting in the 3^rd grade. Most of these students also fall into the category of protected classes under the act, such as the major racial and ethnic groups, low income or special education students. The No Child Left Behind Act therefore requires the schools to change their curriculum for the LEP students in order for the students to perform better on the standardized testing. If the schools do not meet performance, there could be the possibility of closure. (Capp et al. 1) California has not met these standards and with half of the students considered LEP, this is a necessary change.

Per the No Child Left Behind Act, the states must measure their student’s progress in both reading and math through the grade levels three to eight, and once between grades 10 and 12. These measurements are required to be provided to the parents with data illustrating where the child stands academically compared to other children nationwide. (U.S. Department of Education (a) 1) In addition, the Act requires the state to provide the parents with an easy to read detailed report card indicating which courses the child has been successful in and not successful in. The report cards are also to be broken down by race, ethnicity, gender, English language proficiency, migrant status, disability statues, low income status, and information regarding the qualification of the teacher. Furthermore, the Act provides the option for parents to ensure their children are receiving the proper education by being able to transfer to a school that is a higher performing school. The other option is to offer to these children supplemental education services, such as tutoring or an after-school program. (U.S. Department of Education (a) 3) The State of California has allocated funds under Title I, Part A to support the education needs between the high and low performing students (California Department of Education website); however, it is also up to the parents to participate and understand the progress of the child. As mentioned previously, the number of school-age children in California that are from parents who immigrated to the United States is almost half. Perhaps this is more of an issue of the parents not understanding what is available to their child. Furthermore, the parents might not understand the need for an education or they might not understand what the statistics on their child scores mean. With that said, the State of California should possibly implement a program to educate parents on this particular law. This type of program should actually be a federal type of program implemented with the No Child Left Behind Act. There are other states that have high percentages of children from immigrated families and that are considered to be LED. For instance, by the year 2000, immigrants represented one in nine of all U.S. residents, but their children represented one in five of all children under age 18 (Capps et al. 5)

The California Department of Education, along with the No Child Left Behind Act, believes that the teacher needs as much education information in order to be successful. California Department of Education also states that they believe it is the teachers who can close the gap between the minority students and their more affluent peers (California Department of Education website) It has been recognized that teachers who are credentialed to the appropriate subject have a deeper understanding on the content they teach. Part of the No Child Left Behind Act was to require all schools receiving federal assistance to utilize teachers who are “highly qualified”. This meant that the schools could no longer use pre-interns or people working on waivers or emergency permits. In addition, this meant that high schools could no longer assign teachers to courses that were out of their subject field, even with a full teaching credential. In order to ensure that the schools are implementing qualified teachers properly, the state is required to submit an application to the U.S. Department of Education for federal funds. The application requires that the state provides a baseline of data and targets for the percentage of the core academic classes that are being taught by qualified teachers. California submitted its application in June 2003. (Futernick) In California’s application there was some crucial data missing. The percentage of elementary teachers who passed the state assessment and the percentage of secondary core academic subject class teachers who earned their supplementary authorizations by completing the required credits. Per the No Child Left Behind Act, in order to be considered a highly qualified elementary teacher, the teacher must pass an assessment test. “according to the state’s estimate, only 60% in 2002-03 have done so. The remaining 40% have complied with the state’s subject matter requirement by completing an approved undergraduate subject matter program (Futernick)”. In addition, in order to be a highly qualified high school teacher per the No Child Left Behind Act, the teacher must pass a subject matter test or complete one of the coursework options, such as a subject matter program, major, major equivalent or graduate degree in the core area. In the state of California’s application, only 25% of the teachers complied with these requirements. (Futernick) There are several reasons that the state of California is behind and has not been successful with the implementation of the Act. The Act itself has been working for other states; however, California cannot seem to catch up. After the implementation of this Act, California was still hiring and assigning teachers to teach a course even without completing the specific major or passing a subject matter test for that course. The staffing issues for California schools have been a long-standing problem. In addition, California did not update their credential requirements that would coincide with the No Child Left Behind Act. (Futernick) This indicates that it is the state’s fault for not specifically following the guidelines represented to them; however, as of October 2011 the State of California has implemented a required certificate of compliance for all teachers. This certificate is required to be completed for all qualified teachers by trained Local Education Agency (LEA) personnel and signed by the LEA Superintendent. The certificate ensures that the teacher has completed the necessary steps to be considered a “highly qualified” teacher in their subject area. (California Department of Education website)

The No Child Left Behind Act also indicates that the districts and schools must provide the teachers with information about each child’s academic strengths and weaknesses. It is then up to the teacher to make lessons to ensure that the student is meeting or exceeding the standards. An example might show that the test indicates that the children are doing well in multiplication, but are struggling in division. The curriculum would then be adjusted accordingly for the students in regard to learning division and the teacher would receive additional training on teaching division. (U.S. Department of Education (c) 13) Again, why is California not achieving these goals? One possible reason is the response of the Federal Department of Education in regard to the schools that are not meeting the standards.

The Department of Education has indicated that schools that are not showing an increase in achievement may suffer some consequences, such as eventually being shut down. This is leading to the loss of some teachers who are transferring out of the districts. These teachers are qualified teachers; however, they do not want to lose their job. In addition, there are other losses that the children undergo with education when the schools are threatened to be closed. The teachers focus on the subjects that are going to be tested and all other instruction is decreased. In addition, the other types of activities, such as arts, music and sports are reduced in order to increase the standards. Furthermore, the excessive pressures increase this process and compound the school with additional problems as they lose good teachers. (Lee 9).

Perhaps California is under these pressures and is losing teachers to other districts, private schools, or even other states. Other states, such as New York and Florida are offering incentives for teachers to teach there. One solution for California would to be put their efforts into the Title I, Part A part of the No Child Left Behind Act. This Title provides grants to the school districts and the funds are given based on the number of poor children in each school. These funds allow the high poverty ridden schools to adopt programs that can help increase achievement in the low-achieving students. In addition, the funds can be used for services or activities for instruction in reading and mathematics for students that are low-achieving at schools that are not eligible for school-wide programs. Furthermore, the funds are used to provide extended before and after-school programs and even summer programs to increase the amount of learning time throughout the year. (U.S. Department of Education (b) 15)

Title 1 of the Act mandates that the assessment results must be reported for students that are in the protected classes, such as racial and low-income, and again, the schools will be held accountable for their performance of these students. Is it the schools and districts fault that the students are not performing? Why are the parents not liable in this situation? Shouldn’t it be a priority of the parent to ensure that their child is learning and trying to reach these standards? Perhaps some sort of law should be implemented to have the parents of these children required to take parenting classes, as well as English classes and maybe a class that educates the parents on the necessity of an education. If the students are not receiving any help at home, how can we blame the teachers and the schools? It seems that this law may benefit a child who has a higher intelligence that doesn’t necessarily need the extra encouragement or help at home, but for the children who are behind or slower at learning, if there is no help from outside the school, the child may take a longer time to catch up.

California is clearly behind other states in regard to achieving the standards that have been put in place by the No Child Left Behind Act. It is possible this is happening for a variety of reasons. In addition, there is no one group that is the cause. For instance, California has written some goals as well as corrective actions. In addition, California has implemented the certificate of compliance for all teachers to ensure that they are qualified in the subject area they are assigned to. (California Department of Education website) There are also possible problems with the Act that the Federal Government should seek to change on the issue of closing the gap for minority and poor children. It is said that the Act is four years overdue for renewal and a new reform requires that the elected officials come together and implement the changes. (Duncan) This was the central goal of the No Child Left Behind Act; however, there have been no significant changes since it was enacted. (Lee 8) For California this is crucial since about 50% of the school age children are from a minority background and considered on the low poverty scale. (Capps et al. 35) In addition, the parents of the children who are still not achieving need to step up. Again, here is where some changes in the No Child Left Behind Act should take place and incorporate some funds into educating the parents.

There have been almost all states reporting gains in achievement with some of the states reporting that the achievement gap is closing through their state assessments as well; therefore, we can also imply that changes in the school system take time and strong investments in the change of the curriculum and instruction. (The Office Under the Secretary 15) This is most likely what California needs, some more time. The state is putting effort into this Act; however, with half of the percentage of children being on the lower achieving end of the scale, it may take California longer to achieve the education standard goals of the No Child Left Behind Act.

Works Cited

California Department of Education. Title I Part A. Web. June 15, 2011. <http://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/sw/t1/titleparta.asp>

Christopher, K. Still Segregated, Still Unequal: Analyzing the Impact of No Child Left Behind on African American Students. National Urban League. 2007. Print.<http://www.berkeleyrep.org/school/images/knaus.pdf>

Duncan, A. After 10 Years, It’s Time for a New NCLB”. January 8, 2012. Web. <http://www.ed.gov/blog/2012/01/after-10-years-it%e2%80%99s-time-for-a-new-nclb/>

Futernick, K. California and The Federal No Child Left Behind Left Behind Act. November 15, 2003 Web. <http://edfordemocracy.org/TQI/no_child_left_behind.htm>

Lee, J. Tracking achievement gaps and assessing the impact of NCLB on the gaps: An in-depth look into national and state reading and math outcome trends. 2006.

Cambridge, MA: The Civil Rights Project at Harvard University. Print. <http://www.eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED491807.pdf>

The Office Under the Secretary. No Child Left Behind: A Desktop Reference. 2002. Print. 181 pgs. <http://www2.ed.gov/admins/lead/account/nclbreference/reference.pdf>

U.S. Department of Education (a). No Child Left Behind: A Parent’s Guide. 2003. Print. <http://www2.ed.gov/parents/academic/involve/nclbguide/parentsguide.pdf>

U.S. Department of Education (b). Consolidated State Performance Report: Parts I and II for State Formula Grant Programs under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act as amended by the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 For Reporting on School Year 2009-2010 California. 2002. Print.

U.S. Department of Education (c). No Child Left Behind A Toolkit for Teachers. ED Pubs, Education Publications Center, U.S.Department of Education. 2004. Print. <available at: www.ed.gov/teachers/nclbguide/nclb-teachers-toolkit.pdf.>

Schrag, J. No Child Left Behind and it’s Implications for Student’s with Disabilities.

CALState. The Special Edge. 16(2):1-16. 2003. Print. <http://www.calstat.org/publications/pdfs/edge_spring_03.pdf>

Works Referenced

Alliance for Excellent Education. In Need of Improvement: NCLB and High Schools.

Policy Brief. 2007. Print. http://www.all4ed.org/files/archive/publications/NCLB_HighSchools.pdf>