After 14 years, the era of No Child Left Behind might now be in the past. The NCLB Act, passed by a bipartisan Congress vote in 2001, placed significantly greater importance on standardized testing in public schools in the United States. It operated under the assumption that reforming education through high standards and measurable goals could improve the education of individual students. Though it allowed individual states to develop their own standardized tests, it still required them to give them to students at predetermined grade levels. If states failed to do this, they could not receive educational funding from the national government.
Criticism of the act largely centered on its lack of consideration for special needs or disadvantaged students. Under the law, all students must take the same test under the same conditions. This essentially places a “one size fits all” concept to public schooling, which is unrealistic and doesn’t account for variables such as family life, socio-economic status, and more.
Additionally, the act focused on minimum requirements, but provided no incentive for students who perform higher than the average. Over the first five years after the law was passed, federal funding of gifted and talented programs decreased by a third.
On Saturday, President Obama announced restrictions for standardized testing in schools. He claims that students are spending too much time in their classrooms taking tests, and that many of these tests are unnecessary. This time spent testing, according to the White House, takes away valuable time that could be spent teaching, learning, and fostering creativity. In order to combat this, President Obama has proposed limiting standardized exams to taking up no more that 2 percent of instructional time in classrooms.
In a videoposted on Facebook, Obama states that “learning is about so much more than just filling in the right bubble.” He suggests “moderation” and “smart, strategic” tests, and says that teachers are under too much pressure to prepare students for exams, which affects their ability to teach.
According to a study of 66 school districts by the Council of Great City Schools released on Saturday, students in urban public schools will take approximately 112 mandatory standardized tests between Pre-K and graduation.
The announcement comes paired with a ten-page document which outlines a series of steps to help states and educators decide which assessments are excessive and not benefiting students or teachers.
This limit on class testing time is the first step towards education reform, which includes an attempt by Congress to draft a replacement for the No Child Left Behind Act. Teachers’ unions are claiming this as a sort of victory, and are largely happy to see something being done about the excess of standardized testing. Even proponents of more difficult standardized tests seems to be on board with Obama’s plan, specifically the push for more relevant testing and quality over quantity. With this step, it is fair to say the American public can expect more education legislation from Obama before the end of his term in November 2016.
