(Take) Action!

It’s time to stop suffering under NCLB and start changing it.

Congress is now considering changes to No Child Left Behind (NCLB), the current version of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). The window of opportunity could close very quickly, so this is the time to act.

NEA President Reg Weaver presented NEA’s “Positive Agenda” for changing the law at a special congressional hearing this spring. (See “Don’t Be Left Behind,” page 19.) In it, NEA proposes to keep NCLB’s separate reporting of test scores for subgroups of students, so everyone can see where schools need to do better. But instead of putting so much weight on one-size-fits-all standardized tests and punishing schools whose students score low, NEA’s proposal would use multiple measures of student learning to evaluate schools and offer educators real help to close achievement gaps.

Many groups are working alongside NEA to change the law, including school boards, state legislatures, and 115 education, religious, and civil rights organizations.

Bush Administration officials, however, still insist that NCLB only needs minor tweaks. If the law stays the same, studies show that almost every school will be declared failing by 2014 when every child must be “proficient.”

ESEA expires this September, and the battle for a saner sequel could be won or lost in the next few months—perhaps even the next few weeks. The NEA Executive Committee has approved our top priorities for overhauling the law.

The time to educate the public and Congress about what’s happening in our schools is now:

• E-mail your U.S. Representative and Senators and give them your from-the-classroom view of NCLB.
• Write a letter to your local newspaper.
• Contribute to the NEA Fund for Children and Public Education and help elect more pro-public education candidates to office.