« Fix teaching, right now |
Main
| Announcing BoardBuzz 3.0 »
March 29, 2006
NCLB unfair to schools with multiple subgroups
School districts with diverse student populations are disproportionally identified for improvement under the No Child Left Behind Act, according to a new report from the Center on Education Policy.
While only 27 percent of Title I schools nationwide are located in urban school districts, the majority of Title I schools (54 percent) identified for improvement are found in urban school districts, the report found. This outcome does not reflect student performance in those districts. Here's the reason: Urban school districts must demonstrate adequate yearly progress for multiple student subgroups--different racial ethnic subgroups, students with limited English proficiency and students with disabilities; while some rural and suburban school districts may only need to do so with two subgroups--white and low-income students.
The report concludes that urban districts are unfairly targeted for AYP failure under NCLB because students are counted more than once in multiple subgroups. Thus, the AYP structure must be fixed.
NSBA recommends that students belonging to multiple subgroups should be counted as an equal fraction in each of the subgroups totaling one student. Congress must fix this problem or the law will continue to mask the true performance and progress of diverse schools and districts.
Posted March 29, 2006 1:46 PM |
No Child Left Behind
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry
BoardBuzz Feed
