by Casey Jacketta
Daily Utah Chronicle (U. Utah)
(U-WIRE) SALT LAKE CITY -- President Bush's No Child Left Behind Act, enacted last July, does nothing but leave many children behind. The act, which was heralded as a blessing to failing education systems around the country, hasn't lived up to its hype.
The No Child Left Behind Act is intended to bring all federally funded school students up to their grade level by 2014 in reading and math. It requires that schools annually test 95 percent of their students in their proficiency in math and reading skills to make sure they are on track with their grade schools. All this sounds like a good idea, until the law is looked at with more scrutiny.
Democrats have criticized the law for emphasizing high goals but providing little resources to meet these goals. Sen. Edward Kennedy has argued that President Bush has stiffed the act by nearly $6 billion. Bush's plan would therefore provide enough money to test children in public schools, but not enough to prepare them to pass the tests. Essentially, the Bush administration is relying on scare tactics to get test scores up.
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With many states facing enormous budget shortfalls -- some approach $68 billion -- Bush is expecting the states to front the money to get schools up to federal standards. This is impossible.
As all students know, education is often the first area to take a hit when the state Legislature is facing a tighter budget. Even though Utah consistently ranks last on spending per student, legislators argue that Utah schools still rank within the top half of test scores. The top half may not be good enough under the No Child Left Behind Act. And if the federal government doesn't give money to states to help prepare kids in public schools to pass standardized tests, many schools could be shut down.
Another problem with the act is that it forces all public-school students to be held to the same standards. Ninety-five percent of students in public schools must be tested annually until the year 2014, and then tested every other year after that deadline. This includes students who are mentally handicapped, speak English as a second language, are in juvenile correctional facilities or have been taught in perpetually under-funded inner city schools. The Bush administration is holding students who are mentally handicapped to the same standards that they are holding Advanced Placement students.
Inner city schools that have traditionally received less funding than suburban schools will still be held to the same standards as the better-funded suburban schools. For those schools who aren't able to meet these stringent standards, federal funding could be pulled and the "good and smart" students can opt to transfer to "better" schools.
This creates a huge problem. Not only is the Bush administration holding all types of students accountable to the exact same standards, but it is also threatening schools with the revocation of federal funds and the loss of their "good" students to better schools! While students do deserve a good education, the Bush administration must be willing to fund it, not just force schools to meet stringent standards with no extra help.
However, the funding issue is not the act's biggest problem. The biggest problem is that the act involves the military.
For the U.S. military to function, it requires 210,000 young men and women to enroll in full-time service and 150,000 to enlist in the reserves. This number will go up during times of war. The No Child Left Behind Act requires that all federally funded high schools register their juniors and seniors with the military for "recruitment purposes." The act requires high schools to turn over to the military the names, addresses and phone numbers of juniors and seniors.
Parents can protest this in writing, but hardly any of them know about it.
Students at a New York public school have filed a lawsuit with the help of the ACLU to protest the act on privacy grounds.
Giving the names, addresses and phone numbers of students to the military isn't voluntary, it's compulsory in order for schools to receive federal funds. This takes away students' freedom. When colleges come to high school campuses, students have the right to choose which ones they are interested in and whether they want to give those colleges personal information.
When the military comes to campus, though, students have no choice. They are already considered "interested" in the military, just because they attend a federally funded high school.
With war on the horizon, the No Child Left Behind Act is sounding more like the beginnings of a military draft than a genuine attempt to help children catch up. In the wake of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's Jan. 7 comment that soldiers drafted for the Vietnam War gave the United States "no value, no advantage" the Bush administration's requirement that high schools give student information to the military seems strange. If those who are drafted don't really have any value, why take steps to begin a military draft?
By making mentally handicapped students and students in juvenile delinquent facilities test to the same level as average and even above average students, the No Child Left Behind Act serves no purpose. Even worse, the act violates students' privacy rights by handing over information to the military.
Perhaps what we really need to leave behind is the Bush administration.
