KEY MEASURES IN NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND

TESTING

  • The bill requires that all states develop and administer annual proficiency tests in reading and math for all students in grades 3–8. These tests must align with each state’s current academic content standards.

  • Test data will be used to measure the performance of each school. Data will also be disaggregated by race, gender, income, and other criteria to measure and compare the performance of groups.

  • States will receive $400 million to help design and administer the tests.

  • A sample of students in every state will be required to take the 4th and 8th grade National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) in math and reading every year to verify the results of the statewide assessments that all students are required to take. The federal government will cover the cost of state participation in NAEP. No federal rewards or sanctions will be based on the NAEP.

  • States will be required to provide parents with annual report cards detailing the school’s performance and their child’s progress in key subject areas.

ACCOUNTABILITY

  • States will be required to establish a definition of student proficiency using a variety of indicators. The definition of proficiency may be based on either the scores of the state’s lowest-achieving demographic group or the scores of its lowest-achieving schools, whichever would require a higher threshold.

  • States are required to raise the bar gradually, in equal increments, with the requirement that 100 percent proficiency be reached within 12 years. This bar must be raised at least once every three years.

  • Schools that have not met state-defined adequate yearly progress goals for two consecutive years will be identified by districts as needing improvement. Immediately after identification, these schools would receive technical assistance to improve performance and to develop a two-year plan to increase performance. These schools would also be eligible to receive federal funds for school improvement.

  • Parents with a child in a school that has been identified as needing improvement would be allowed to transfer their child to a better-performing public or charter school immediately after the school is designated as failing.

  • If a school identified as needing improvement has not made adequate yearly progress after three consecutive years, the district must continue to offer public school choice to all students in that school and provide low-achieving students within the school approximately $500–$1,000 for additional educational services and summer school programs. Parents would be able to select private, church-related, and religiously affiliated organizations to provide these services to students.

  • A school identified as needing improvement that fails to make adequate progress after four consecutive years would be subject to reconstitution, hiring of a private management contractor, conversion to a charter school, or staff restructuring.

  • To be taken out of corrective action, a school needs to demonstrate adequate yearly progress for two consecutive years.

TEACHER QUALITY

  • The bill prohibits mandatory national teacher testing and certification.

  • Beginning the first school year after the bill is enacted, each local school receiving federal Title I funds will be required to ensure that all teachers hired and teaching in a program supported by those funds are fully qualified.

  • States will be required to submit a plan to ensure that every teacher in the state is fully qualified to teach in his or her subject area by the end of the 2005–06 school year.

  • States and local school districts will be allowed to use funds for teacher testing and merit pay. The bill also allows states to use ESEA funds to develop alternative routes to teacher certification.

READING

  • The bill provides funding to support proven methods of reading instruction backed by scientific research.

FLEXIBILITY

  • The bill allows all states and local school districts to transfer up to 50 percent of the federal non-Title I funding they receive to programs and services of their choice (within certain broad guidelines). Allocation of funds would be determined by states and local school officials and would not require the approval of the U.S. Department of Education.

FUNDING

The Federal Year 2002 authorization level for the bill is approximately $26.3 billion. The bill provides

  • $13.5 billion for Title I, an increase of $4.9 billion over last year’s appropriated level.

  • $3.175 billion for teacher quality, an increase of $1 billion over last year’s appropriated level.

  • $750 million for bilingual education, and increase of $304 million over last year’s appropriated level.

 
© Quality Learning 2002