There are risks that states may set goals too low or not act quickly enough, said Daria Hall, vice president for government affairs and communication at the Education Trust.
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School administrators say they are happy that students will be graded by their overall performance in school.
Archbishop George J. Lucas of Omaha, Nebraska, committee chairman, said the act demonstrates “broad bipartisan agreement on restoring equitable treatment of private schools and ensuring that all children are afforded the education services, benefits and opportunities they deserve, regardless of the type of school they attend”. It replaces the 2002 No Child Left Behind education law.
Under the new act, schools will still have to test students in third through eighth grades and again in high school, but teachers have more flexibility when it comes to doing the testing. President Barack Obama called the law “a big step in the right direction”, and its bi-partisan support in both the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate suggested that is was high-time for some change in education policy.
Teachers say the No Child Left Behind Act was one-size-fits-all, but administrators said that didn’t work. State education officials have said the additional funding could allow school districts to hire teacher assistants. Al Franken also spent months working on the measure.
The new law also clearly specified which schools will be needing intervention.
No more Common Core-maybe.
Plus, States’ will now have more say on curriculum.
Already some states have begun backing away from the standards.
The Communities In Schools program is available to any school district – Hess estimates it costs $65,000-$80,000 per on-site coordinator – but only large school districts tend to have the necessary funding to use it. While ESSA will not increase the Title I funding for each school district, it does authorize the schools to spend their money specifically on integrated student services. That data will still have to be reported publicly and parsed for income level, race, disability and English-language learning. These include a unanimously-approved amendment written by Cochran and Senator Jack Reed (D-R.I.) to all authorize the use of federal funds to improve and modernize school libraries.
It’s now up to the states. Standardized tests will not be the only factor considered when evaluating a school.
The measure would substantially limit the ‘s role, barring the Education Department from telling states and local districts how to assess and teacher performance.
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“No Child Left Behind” ends at the end of this school year.
