Six states accepted for ED’s NCLB alternative assessment pilot program
U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings has announced that Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Illinois, Maryland, and Ohio have been approved to participate in a pilot program that will allow them administer their own prescription for ailing schools under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), the Associated Press reports in the New York Sun. States approved have developed plans to more closely tailor solutions to individual schools' problems and focus resources on schools in the worst shape, rather than having to take specific steps at specific times, the NCLB approach critics charge is too rigid and treats schools the same regardless of whether they miss the mark by a little or a lot. “We expect to see a closer fit between the causes of school underperformance and a focused attention at repairing those sources of failure,” said Margaret Raymond, the director of an education think tank at Stanford University and the chair of a panel that reviewed the state proposals. Examples of changes the states plan to make include requiring schools to offer tutoring earlier than is currently called for and a greater reliance, in Indiana for example, on testing throughout the year to catch academic weak spots. In Florida, schools with low-performing students will likely be assigned teachers who have experience teaching similar students successfully. Maryland is placing more emphasis on training principals.
Source: New York Sun, 7/2/08, By Nancy Zuckerbrod (Associated Press)
[Editor’s Note: The full text of Secretary Spellings’ announcement on the selections for the Differentiated Accountability Pilot program is included in the U.S. Department of Education’s (ED) press release below. Background on the pilot program is at the second link. Details from the affected states are provided in the local news reports.]
ED press release
NSBA School Law pages on Florida’s pilot program application
Treasure Coast Palm, 7/3/08, By Kelly Tyko
Augusta Chronicle, 7/2/08, By Greg Gelpi
Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, 7/2/08, By Kelly Soderlund
Chicago Daily Herald, 7/3/08, By Emily Krone
Baltimore Sun, 7/2/08, By Liz Bowie
Akron Beacon Journal, 7/2/08, By John Higgins