Calling a bipartisan bill signing a “Christmas miracle”, President Barack Obama wasted no time signing the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, titled the Every Student Succeeds Act, which the Senate had overwhelming approved less than 24 hours earlier.
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Under ESSA some tests remain: 3rd through 8th graders test in Reading and Math and once in high school.
More children from low- and moderate-income families will have access to preschool through a new grant program that is to use existing funding to support state efforts.
The new law does away with the federally dictated consequences that schools faced under No Child Left Behind that became more severe each year they failed to meet performance targets.
Democrats and Republicans in Congress were able to fashion a new bill that devolved powers to the states – without simply tossing out every single facet of the old law.
Even though NCLB has been praised for addressing equal opportunity education, it also drew criticism from parents, students, and teachers alike over claims that it promoted a “test-and-punish era”.
Before the signing, President Obama made clear that he believed the goals of NCLB – namely high standards, accountability and closing the achievement gap – were the right ones.
Illinois Federation of Teachers President Dan Montgomery was among those at the education bill’s signing Thursday.
Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., who chairs the House’s education panel, said under the new approach, American classrooms will no longer be “micromanaged” by the Education Department in Washington.
But that may be too rosy a picture, says Tom Gentzel, the executive director of the National School Boards Association. The Every Child Succeeds Act goes into effect in July.
“The biggest thing with this is the recognition is the need to stay accountable, but really basing it on the demographics of our state, the things we think are important and giving that control back to local states to make decisions important to them based on each individual population”, Schopp said.
But now No Child Left Behind has been left behind by the new federal education plan called Every Student Succeeds.
The new law is an “incremental step forward”, state Education Secretary Rebecca Holcombe said in a statement.
The law also changes in the way schools and districts are rated.
“No Child Left Behind actually required that states adopt standards, but there was no benchmark by which those standards could be compared, state-to-state”, Snowberger said.
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Without having federal regulation on Common Core standards, Louisiana may finally get a chance to stop focusing so much on standardized testing, and start focusing on educating the students.
