Schools Forum at Convention Draws 400

This chapter seeks to examine the impact of two federal policies, No Child Left Behind (NCLB) and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), on educators in the USA during the past decade of reform. NCLB was signed into law in 2002 and is having a profound effect on the education of all students, including students considered at risk for academic failure, such as students with disabilities, students from diverse racial and ethnic minority groups, students from low socioeconomic (SES) backgrounds, and students who are Limited English Proficient (LEP), better known as English Language Learners (ELLs). NCLB “moved the federal government’s role in education from being primarily a source of funding—now about 9% of every public school dollar—to being a major factor in shaping the substance of P-12 curriculum and instruction” (Lieberman, 2008: 1). The most central requirements of NCLB relate to accountability and raising academic expectations. This law mandates that all students (including those from the aforementioned groups) must make adequate yearly progress (AYP). The overall goal is that all students should be achieving reading and math at grade level by the end of the 2013–2014 school year. NCLB establishes that all students must be taught core academic content by teachers who are highly qualified. A 2007 report by the US Department of Education (USDOE) states NCLB requires states to set standards for all teachers to be considered highly qualified and districts to notify parents of students … if their child’s teacher does not meet these ­standards. The requirements apply to all teachers of core academic subjects: English, reading or language arts, mathematics, science, foreign languages, civics and government, economics, arts, history, and geography and the requirements also apply to teachers who provide instruction in these subjects to students with limited English proficiency (LEP) and students with disabilities. (USDOE/www.ed.gov/rschstat/eval/teaching/nclb/execsum.html)

With the internationalisation of higher education, students from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds represent a significant proportion of the university student body in Australia. Research literature indicates that the unique cultural and linguistic challenges experienced by these students may adversely impact their academic performance and social integration in university settings. However, less is known about how the socio-emotional competencies of undergraduate CALD and non-CALD domestic English-speaking students compare. This cross-sectional quantitative study compares the emotional and social competencies in a cohort of CALD and non-CALD occupational therapy undergraduates. Data were collected at one Australian university from a group of 360 students enrolled in the Bachelor of Occupational Therapy (Honours) course. Participants completed the Emotional and Social Competency Inventory– University edition (ESCI-U). Multivariate regression analyses were used to compare between CALD and non-CALD students, controlling for students’ year level of study, age, and gender. Key findings from the regression analysis included the observation of indicate that non-CALD students having significant higher scores than CALD students on all the ESCI-U socio-emotional subscales, especially the Emotional Self-control, Achievement Orientation, Empathy and Teamwork from western perspectives. No difference was found between CALD and non-CALD student on two cognitive competencies- systems thinking and pattern recognition. These findings should be interpreted with caution considering CALD students may interpret the questions differently and demonstrate the competencies in different ways. Specific emotional and social competencies that need to be strengthened in students are discussed and recommendations are made to inform the preparation of evidence-based curricula.

Drawing on eight waves of the Schools and Staffing Survey and the National Teacher and Principal Survey, we used a difference-in-differences research design to examine special education teachers’ (SETs) responses to No Child Left Behind (NCLB) and the subsequent reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). IDEA was associated with decreases in the proportion of SETs with special education as a field of study and graduate degrees, an increase in co-teaching, and a decrease in the proportion of SETs working in a resource delivery model, with no evidence that NCLB influenced these outcomes. Little consistent evidence was found to indicate these federal policies influenced SETs’ job attitudes (e.g., job satisfaction). We identified differences in these associations based on school poverty status and grade level. These findings help to better understand the status and challenges of the current SET workforce and the unintended consequences of federal reform policies.

Both the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation and the Least Restrictive Environment (LRE) clause within Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) of 2004 have impacted the educational service delivery for students with disabilities and the paraeducators that provide support services. As more schools turn to inclusionary practices, the impetus for highly trained paraeducators becomes of even more importance. The purpose of this mixed-methodology survey study was to identify the current practices and barriers of training for paraeducators who work with students with autism in inclusive settings and to compare and contrast the perspectives of principals, special education teachers, and paraeducators regarding these practices and barriers. This survey included 96 participants across the three participant groups. Discussion centers on the inadequate amount of training paraeducators receive, confusion on who is responsible for providing paraeducator training, the use of ineffective training methods, and making paraeducators a priority within the school structure.

Equipping teachers for the full range of diversity of students in today's schools has long been a shared concern among teacher educators. Bilingual education, special education, culturally responsive teaching, social justice education, and urban education are among the several responses to this fundamental educational goal. These responses, however, although critical for moving the project of educational equity forward, have tended to produce conversations within diversity communities in teacher education rather than across them. The aim of this special issue is to open up what we believe to be a long overdue conversation among scholars from different diversity communities within teacher education to begin to think about what is needed if we are to advance teacher education that is responsive to the full range of diversity of students and that takes account of the multiple markers of identity that characterize individuals and groups of students--disability among them. This special issue grew out of a major session that took place at the 2010 Annual Meeting of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE) titled Diversity Frameworks in Teacher Education: Where Does Special Education Belong? The purpose of that session was to initiate a dialogue among teacher education leaders in multicultural education, culturally responsive teaching, social justice education, and special education to begin to unravel the enduring and thorny problem of why, given the longstanding rhetoric of preparing teachers for diversity, there has been comparatively little discussion about the role of special education within the larger discourse of diversity of race, class, culture, and language. The roots of that session can be traced back to discussions that began in 2002, during a 5-year joint, federally funded project housed within the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC) in the Council of Chief State School Officers, with AACTE as one of the lead partners. In response to the call for special education teachers to become highly qualified under No Child Left Behind (NCLB) and the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), teams participating in this project, representing 45 states and made up of higher education faculty in general and special education and their respective counterparts at the state level, started to grapple with the question of what it meant to prepare novice teachers for in this new policy context. Team members began to raise important issues about preparing general education teachers for students with disabilities as an integral part of teacher education reform. With this special issue of Journal of Teacher Education (JTE), we broaden this question for the teacher education community: How can we work together to advance a more complete vision of diversity, one that does not merely attach disability to a long list of social markers of identity, but rather works from the assumption-and indeed the fact--that the children and youth for whom we prepare teachers do not have just one diversity identity, but rather multiple diversity identities that interact with and nest within one another in different and often complex ways. We appreciate the willingness of the scholars whose work appears in this issue--Marilyn Cochran-Smith and Curt Dudley-Marling, Jacqueline Jordan Irvine, Robert Rueda and Jamy Stillman, and Ana Maria Villegas--to join us in a rich conversation that pushes at the outer margins of the many diversity communities in which their and our work is typically situated. …

The structure of American public schools has altered within the past 30 years due to receiving extensive number of linguistically diverse students. The fact that culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) students often experience academic failure within the U.S. public schools creates a subgroup of students who cannot achieve their educational goals. The purpose of this study is to explore ideal practices in order to enhance teachers' and policy makers' perceptions and awareness on the unique needs of CALD students. The findings of this study reveal the fact that ineffective methods for teaching CALD students and short-term goal-oriented educational policies fall short of meeting the academic needs of CALD students, and this research offers a conceptual framework that could contribute to CALD students' intellectual growth through effective and constructive language learning practices.

Control over education is a power that the Constitution reserves for the states, not the federal government. But, for the reasons Ms. McColl explains in this article, answering the question she raises in the title is not such an easy matter. THE No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, the 2001 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, has become a symbol of all things good and bad in education. While the basic concepts of the legislation -- accountability for results, research-based education programs, increased parental options, and expanded local control and flexibility -- have wide support, some critics have argued that NCLB has failed to deliver.1 Others have focused on how best to implement its provisions.2 Although this scrutiny of the requirements and outcomes of NCLB is crucial to the policy debate, the law has largely escaped a more fundamental review, and answers to the following questions are needed: Has Congress overstepped its legal authority with No Child Left Behind? Is NCLB a constitutional exercise of congressional power, or does it infringe on states' rights? What is the role of the U.S. Department of Education (ED) in addressing ambiguities in the law? Answering these questions requires a close examination of federalism as it is expressed in the U.S. Constitution and interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court. call to examine the law in this light comes with a warning: reaching conclusions about whether Congress acted within the limits of its constitutional authority may cause some discomfort. Liberals may find their customary inclination to favor a more expanded role for the federal government to be in conflict with their concern about the substance of NCLB. Conservatives may similarly find their general bias in favor of states' rights to be in conflict with their support for the accountability and school-choice elements of NCLB. And if the courts ignore, as they should, both the politics surrounding NCLB and its education reform goals, the results of a legal challenge could be interesting, indeed. A conservative Supreme Court may ultimately conclude that President George W. Bush's education agenda exceeds constitutional bounds. Is There Constitutional Authority for NCLB? There is little dispute over whether NCLB represents an unprecedented level of federal involvement in the affairs of our public schools. However, there is disagreement between the law's supporters, who hail this federal intrusion into state and local education as effective national reform, and its detractors, who argue that the intrusion consists of a set of politically motivated mandates that are detrimental to our schools. language of NCLB speaks to the sweeping authority intended by its passage: The purpose of the title is to ensure that all children have a fair, equal, and significant opportunity to obtain a high-quality education and reach, at a minimum, proficiency on challenging state academic achievement standards and state academic assessments. To accomplish this, NCLB sets extensive requirements for states, including establishing an accountability system and staffing schools with high-quality professionals. This level of federal intrusion into a domain typically under state control raises legal questions because Congress must act within the limits of federal authority established by the U.S. Constitution. Constitution reflects a careful balance between the powers of the federal government and those of the states. James Madison argued, The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.3 Constitution defines this balance in the 10th Amendment: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Past court decisions, most notably San Antonio v. …

This year's Bracey Report begins and ends with the item that will continue to dominate education news: No Child Left Behind. TO PRODUCE last year's report required me to sift through 21/2 drawers full of materials. This year, there were 31/2 drawers. Attention is being paid to public education; much of it is not benign. On the education news front, budgets and No Child Left Behind (NCLB) dominated. Because readers certainly know the budget situation in their own states, we begin with NCLB, in two parts. NCLB: The AYP Trap Last year's report said of No Child Left Behind, [It's] a trap, a Trojan Horse . . . choose your metaphor. These days, Americans speak mostly in war images, so I now call NCLB a weapon of mass destruction targeted at the public schools in a campaign of shock and awe, which, given the incredible underreaction of educators, I must conclude is working. I first expressed that sentiment in an article that no one would publish in April 2002. (The article can be found at www.america-tomorrow.com/bracey/EDDRA.) No one seemed to believe it then. They do now. At the April 2003 meeting of the American Educational Research Association (AERA), several employees of the U.S. Department of Education approached me to express dismay over NCLB and over working for an ideologically driven department. These are sad times, indeed. One career staffer declared that NCLB should be renamed: NCL-B.S. As all Kappan readers surely know by now, all schools must test all students every year in grades 3 through 8 in reading and math, with science to be added in 2006-07. Schools must demonstrate adequate yearly progress (AYP). For a school to show AYP, all ethnic groups, all major socioeconomic groups, English-language learners, and special education students must make AYP separately. Ninety-five percent of each group must be tested, and, if any one group fails to make AYP, the school as a whole fails. The official phrase is needs improvement, but headlines across the nation reveal how everyone actually thinks about it: Most Schools in Failing, Los Angeles Daily News, 24 July 2003; State Adds 544 Schools to Failing List -- for Now, Grand Rapids Press, 12 July 2003; It's Pass or Fail; All or Nothing, Raleigh News Observer, 13 July 2003. Schools must continue to make AYP until, by 2014, 100% of a school's students must score In last year's report, I contended that, while the law allowed each state to define proficient, that wouldn't last and that the NAEP (National Assessment of Education Progress) definition of would come to rule. I claimed that this would happen even though the NAEP achievement levels have been rejected as fundamentally flawed by everyone who has ever analyzed them. This includes the General Accounting Office, the Center for Research in Evaluation, Student Standards, and Testing (CRESST), the National Academy of Education, and the National Academy of Sciences. Even so, in his presidential address to AERA, Robert Linn, co-director of CRESST at the University of Colorado and UCLA, made no attempt to provide or use any definition of proficient other than that rendered by NAEP.1 Educational researchers now assume that proficient means NAEP proficient. Secretary of Education Rod Paige has said that he will use the discrepancy between the performance on NAEP and the performance on state tests to shame schools into better performance.2 Certainly those discrepancies will be there for Paige to point to, and in many instances they will be huge. To see why, we need only look at the Princeton Review's comparisons of performance on state tests with performance on NAEP.3 Ironically, the largest discrepancy is for Texas, the home state of Secretary Paige and President Bush. Texas declared 91% of its eighth-graders proficient in math. NAEP says only 24% of Texas students reach that level. Although there are some states where the differences are small and even four states that have tougher requirements than NAEP (Arizona, Louisiana, Missouri, and Maine), the average difference is 23%, and for 22 states, the difference exceeds 30%. …

ABOUT THE AUTHORS PREFACE: By What Means? The Devil is in The Details! (Fenwick English). INTRODUCTION: NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND, SYMBOLISM OR REALITY? (Frank Brown and Richard C. Hunter) PART I: EDUCATIONAL EQUITY AND NCLB. Fiscal Equity Under Title I and Non-Title I Schools in Local School Districts. (Jim Lyons). NCLB and Diversity in Schools. (Stephen B. Lawton). School Choice and Equity under NCLB In The Post-Brown Era. (Frank Brown). No Child Left Behind: The Balm of Gilead Has Arrived in American Education. (Philip T.K. Daniel). NCLB and the New ESEA Title I Program: Poverty and Education. (Richard C. Hunter). Reconceptualizing Accountability in Urban Schools. (Carolyn Talbert-Johnson and Charles J. Russo). The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and Charter Schools. (Preston Green and Joseph Oluwole). Struggling to Mend it or End it: Legal and Legislative Issues in the Brief History of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. (Saran Donahoo and Norman Greer). Title VII, Bilingual Education of NCLB and Immigrant Students in Urban Schools. (Reynaldo Contreras). PART II: NCLB AND PROCESS Accountability, High Stakes Testing and No Child Left Behind. (Linda Tillman). Resiliency Among African American male students. (Tawannah Alan). The Achievement Gap and the No Child Left Behind Act: Is There a Connection. (Mark A. Gooden and Teresa Y. Nowlin). Public Education in an Era of Neo-Liberal Globalization: The Broken Promise of No Child Left Behind. (Jite Eferakorho). Democratic Notions Informing Equity in Mathematics Education. (Lecretia A. Buckley). Public School Choice: The New K-12 Desegregation Model? (Dawn G. Williams). The Role of Parents under NCLB. (Richard C. Hunter). Educational Equity, Globalization, and the No Child Left Behind Act. (Frank Brown). Immigration, Urban Schools, and Accountability. (Xue Lan Rong). A Nation Still at Risk: No Child Left Behind and the Salvation of Disadvantaged Students. (M. Christopher Brown II, T. E. Dancy II, & Nicole Norfles).

Professional confusion, as well as case law confusion, exists concerning the fidelity and integrity of response to intervention (RTI) as a defensible procedure for identifying children as having a specific learning disability (SLD) under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Division is generated because of conflicting mandates specified in IDEA when compared to mandates in the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). This article is submitted to address (a) concerns about the misuse of RTI in identifying students with SLD and (b) how schools face the challenges of identifying students with learning disabilities, providing appropriate services within the least restricted environment while attempting to meet the requirements found in NCLB that all children will learn on grade level and be assessed accordingly.

RationaleCultural and social isolation, microaggressions, and few culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) mentors contribute to a lack of belonging on clinical education experiences (CEEs) for CLD Doctor of Physical Therapy students. The purpose was to investigate whether a multiple mentor model including a CLD learner, their clinical instructor (CI), and CLD mentor could develop CI cross-cultural psychological capital (CC PsyCap) and mentoring skills to support CLD learners on CEEs.MethodsThree CLD learners and their CIs were each matched with a CLD mentor. CIs completed online cross-cultural mentor training and met with the CLD student and mentor four times during the 10-week CEE. CIs completed the CC PsyCap survey to measure changes in CI cross-cultural self-efficacy before and after the CEE. Interview data from participants were thematically analyzed.ResultsAll CIs demonstrated an increase in CC PsyCap scores over the study period. CIs gained insight into the unique needs of CLD learners, often subjected to bias and discrimination, and developed strategies to proactively support learners. CLD learners faced challenges related to race in the CEE and pressure to assimilate. They valued CLD mentors who role-modeled persistence and success and CIs who celebrated diversity and created a welcoming environment.Clinical relevanceCIs play an important role in mentoring CLD learners on CEEs. This study highlighted that CI CC PsyCap can be developed through mentoring and coaching from CLD mentors, ultimately increasing support for CLD learners on CEEs.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the policy process that led to the passage of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act in the United States and the Bush Administration's role in this process.Design/methodology/approachThe research design is historical and archival. A description of the NCLB Act is given and the major provisions and implementation are focused upon. How the Bush Administration helped create the opportunity to pass the NCLB Act by building coalitions, and how public opinion affected the evolution of the policy process is focused upon. Finally, a description is given on how policy ideas like the concept of “accountability” shaped the policy process, and both inspired and constrained the Bush Administration.FindingsThe paper argues that the Bush Administration helped create the opportunity to pass the NCLB Act by building coalitions, and public opinion affected the evolution of the policy process. Policy ideas like the concept of “accountability” shaped the policy process, and both inspired and constrained the Bush Administration.Research limitations/implicationsThe case is limited to the United States and NCLB, although those cases are particularly important in North America and in evaluation‐based research.Practical implicationsThe paper shows how a policy designer can be limited both by political initiatives and his or her own conceptual grounding.Originality/valueThis paper is one of the first to connect the policy process that guided President Bush's design of the NCLB legislation with the concept of “accountability”. Accountability is a foundational concept in the design of quality assurance systems.

Today's educators live in fear of draconian consequences of to make yearly under No Child Left Behind Act. Mr. Popham offers sage advice on how to comply with law and not get hurt. ONE OF B. F. Skinner's little-known principles of reinforcement states, If any organism, human or subhuman, discerns prospect of impending pain, that organism will attempt to avoid such This principle, often shunned by strict behaviorists because it seems corrupted by cognitive overtones, was first articulated in 1965 in an unpublished essay. The essay is known chiefly because of Skinner's concluding comment that inside every fat rat is a thin rat yearning for food pellets. Skinner's pain-avoidance principle was somewhat unimaginatively identified by Skinner as pain-avoidance principle. In referring to it, reinforcement theorists typically use its initials: PAP. Pain Potential of a Federal Law PAP, then, describes proclivity of organisms to avoid upcoming pain. And if ever there was a law that possessed enormous potential for inflicting pain, it is surely No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. Signed into law in early 2002, this federal statute is thought by some analysts to be, in fact, an enormous pile of pap. The NCLB pain to be avoided, of course, is associated with formidable set of aversive consequences that kick in when a public school fails to get its students to make adequate yearly progress (AYP), as measured by improvements on approved achievement tests. At best, a school that fails to make AYP is merely regarded by public as ineffectual. However, those failing schools that receive Title I funds are placed on an improvement track that, in time, can improve a school right out of existence. In following analysis, I offer guidance to my public school colleagues who, yearning to dodge distress brought on by NCLB, sometimes operate solely on basis of PAP. First, I will identify a number of tactics currently being employed to escape pain of NCLB and then describe a set of tactics -- not yet widely in use -- that show considerable PAP potential. Following inspirational insight of Stephen Potter, who in 1947 introduced us to gamesmanship as the art of winning games without actually cheating, I shall refer to all of these tactics -- sometimes psychometric, sometimes psychological, sometimes psychotic -- as ploys. More specifically, I will dub them NCLB PAP Ploys. I won't spend much space on array of NCLB PAP Ploys that are already in widespread use. Clearly, word is getting around regarding which tactics can help evade AYP-induced failure. As more educators learn about these federally sanctioned schemes to avoid pain, we can safely predict that education profession's mimicry machine will kick into high gear. My chief purpose here is to introduce educators to a set of inchoate, innovative tactics that, if employed adroitly, will stave off a great deal of suffering. NCLB PAP Ploys Now in Use 1. Challenge chopping. Because a state's yearly NCLB tests must, by federal law, be based directly on a state's challenging goals, and because students' low scores on those tests will lead to AYP failure, some states have tried to minimize NCLB-induced casualties simply by lowering challenge levels of their state curricula. Many educators have already learned to their distress that -- from a public relations perspective -- such wholesale reductions in a state's aspirations must be labeled with consummate care. For obvious reasons, these sorts of endeavors should not be described as expectation lowering, standard softening, or dreaded dumbing down. Indeed, there is even some risk in referring to such an overhaul of state as curriculum revision. Revision, after all, could go either way. The best label for such challenge chopping currently appears to be curricular refinement. …

THE National Education Association (NEA) has been asked whether we endorse petition (see page 273) being circulated by Educator Roundtable that calls on members of U.S. Congress to vote against reauthorization of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. The short answer? Absolutely not. While initiators of petition are well meaning and share many of same concerns NEA has about NCLB, petition does not represent our views. For example, it calls for dismantling of NCLB and does not propose any positive changes or alternatives, such as those articulated in our own document, ESEA: It's Time for a Change: NEA's Positive Agenda for ESEA Reauthorization. The NEA agrees with many of 16 reasons articulated in petition that argue why law cannot be salvaged. However, association disagrees with petition's conclusion--that NCLB should be repealed. Instead, we believe that several substantive changes that overhaul statute would produce a far better result. In addition, there is no chance that Congress will repeal NCLB. Those who do not articulate a positive set of changes to law will simply not be at table in negotiating any improvements to it. Furthermore, NCLB is current version of Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), so it's not clear what repealing NCLB would actually mean. Eliminating ESEA and its important programs such as Title I? Reverting back to 1994 version of ESEA, which would eliminate key provisions added in 2002, such as strengthened rights for homeless children? Or eliminating law's negative features, such as adequate yearly progress (AYP) and annual testing provisions? Among positive provisions mandated by NCLB is disaggregation of student data. That requirement alone has highlighted deficiencies in educational opportunities for several groups of students. In addition, NCLB has good intentions--closing achievement gaps between various groups of students, raising overall student achievement (at least as measured on statewide tests in reading and math), and ensuring that all students have highly qualified teachers. However, NEA has long argued that law's good intentions have gone seriously awry. While Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings has said that NCLB is like Ivory Soap; it's 99.9% pure or something ... there's not much needed in way of change, reality is that it is not working. Among its myriad flaws and negative outcomes are a narrowing of curricula and projection that virtually all schools will eventually fail to meet its one-size-fits all, all-or-nothing AYP mandate. There is also little evidence that NCLB has directly contributed to its own major goal--raising student test scores. In addition, law has significant flaws in how it tests and counts test scores earned by both English-language learners and students with disabilities. And its regimen of consequences, sanctions, and punishments has no research base and has not been shown to help close achievement gaps. Finally, NCLB is seriously underfunded--with cumulative shortfall between amounts actually appropriated and amounts authorized in law exceeding $56 billion over six years. The NEA is not alone in calling for fundamental changes in law. A coalition of more than 129 national groups--including NAACP (National Association for Advancement of Colored People), Children's Defense Fund, National PTA, National Council of Churches, and National Alliance of Black School Educators--has called for 14 changes to law, noting that the law's emphasis needs to shift from applying sanctions for failing to raise test scores to holding states and localities accountable for making systemic changes that improve student achievement.(1) Let's take a look at some of these flaws and failures in more depth. …

You have accessThe ASHA LeaderPolicy Analysis1 Sep 2007Reauthorization of No Child Left Behind Inches Ahead Neil Snyder Neil Snyder Google Scholar More articles by this author https://doi.org/10.1044/leader.PA2.12132007.38 SectionsAbout ToolsAdd to favorites ShareFacebookTwitterLinked In Reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act is uncertain as Congress returns from its summer break, but legislators have made a preliminary move. On Aug. 28, Reps. George Miller (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, and Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-Calif.), chairman and ranking member of the Committee on Education and Labor, released a staff discussion draft of Title 1 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The draft was developed through input received at nearly two dozen congressional hearings and from discussions with many groups, including ASHA, about re-authorization legislation. The information, along with ASHA’s comments, can be viewed on the “Take Action” Web site. Comments were due by Sept. 5. The draft focused on Title 1, the core of NCLB, which includes assessment requirements, aggregated data, and other hot-button issues. NCLB, first passed in 2002, includes 12 titles. Some reports speculate that Miller will introduce a major re-authorization bill and move it through his committee as early as this month. ASHA is promoting several NCLB reforms, including greater access to professional development opportunities for members, public disclosure of professional qualifications of teachers and school-based SLPs and audiologists, the use of multiple measurements for assessing children with disabilities, and improvements to Early Reading First and Reading First programs. Although public sentiment supports re-opening and repairing the law, politics behind it may prevent a quick resolution. Nearly a dozen members of the House and Senate are running for re-election, and thus are focused on their campaigns. It may be impossible to pass a bill through two legislative chambers for signature by the president before the current administration ends in 2008. Education Programs Update ASHA is supporting H.R. 3419, the Reducing Barriers to Learning Act of 2007, introduced by Rep. Dave Loebsack (D-Iowa). Loebsack’s bill would establish an Office of Specialized Instructional Support Services in the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) and provide grants to state educational agencies to reduce barriers to learning. No position or office within the DOE is responsible for coordinating federal government efforts involving school-based professionals such as SLPs, audiologists, occupational therapists, physical therapists, psychologists, counselors, and social workers. In his bill, Loebsack cites “70% of children receiving services from speech-language pathologists make progress in emergent literacy skills, and 75% make progress in word recognition, an important component of literacy skills; over two-thirds of classroom teachers report that students receiving these services show improved reading skills in the classroom.” IDEA, last re-authorized in 2004, is not scheduled for another review until 2010. The Higher Education Act, already passed by the Senate, is in progress in the House. Visit the “Take Action” Web site to contact members of Congress or visit the ASHA NCLB Web site for more information. NCLB Web sites U.S. Department of Education Commission on NCLB House Education& Labor Committee, Democrats House Education & Labor Committee, Republicans Library of Congress, Thomas Legislative Information Author Notes Neil Snyder, director of federal advocacy, can be reached at at [email protected] or 800-498-2071, ext. 4257. Advertising Disclaimer | Advertise With Us Advertising Disclaimer | Advertise With Us Additional Resources FiguresSourcesRelatedDetails Volume 12Issue 13September 2007 Get Permissions Add to your Mendeley library History Published in print: Sep 1, 2007 Metrics Downloaded 58 times Topicsasha-topicsleader_do_tagleader-topicsasha-article-typesCopyright & Permissions© 2007 American Speech-Language-Hearing AssociationLoading ...