NCLB: All the Wrong Questions?

This year Labor Day weekend marked not only the start of a new school year, but the full-scale launch of the 2006 election season as well. Thirty-seven governorships, one-third of the Senate, and the entire House of Representatives are up for election. Once they take their seats next January one of the first orders of business they face will be the reauthorization of the 2001 Elementary and Secondary Education Act — or what is now called the No Child Left Behind Act.

Education Secretary Margaret Spellings recently declared the law is, like Ivory Soap, 99.9% pure and in no need of improvement. On the other hand, public opinion polling shows that almost 70% of Americans who are familiar with NCLB feel it has no effect on or is hurting our schools. Perhaps this reflects the confusing and often contradictory way in which states and the federal government report test scores, as noted in our guest commentary by William Mathis. Or maybe it is the way in which federal regulations are running roughshod over state systems such as is the case in Nebraska. Or maybe it's just that in spite of all the rhetoric, NCLB does not get at the most central issues we must address as a nation if we are to have the schools we want and that our democracy requires.

While The Forum is a co-signer on a set of proposed changes to NCLB, we are committed to raising questions that go well beyond the current legislative battles. These questions can change the conversation about our public schools and the democracy they serve. They are questions about equity, about learning democratic habits, about accountability, and about the childhoods our children deserve.

Equity: We need a national conversation that seriously addresses issues of educational equity. Beginning with the principles that we are all created equal, have inalienable rights, and live in a democracy where one person-one vote is the most fundamental of all our political norms, we must move on to address the prevailing inequities in our public schools. Why should the quality of any American child's education depend upon their zip code (see Jonathan Kozol's Shame of a Nation)? How can we reconcile a system of pay and benefits that provides the largest rewards to those who teach children with the most privileged backgrounds? How do we address equity without engaging in a "Robin Hood" debate, but rather in a way that raises educational opportunities for all children simultaneously? And if we cannot commit ourselves to addressing education equity, what hope is there for political equity or our very democracy? (Forum Convener Gloria Ladson-Billings will be addressing these very questions on October 13th at the "High Poverty Schooling in America" conference in Chapel Hill, North Carolina).

Learning for Democracy: Much is said about school renewal so that young people are better prepared for lives of work, learning, and citizenship, but little is done around the third, and most important, leg of this triad — citizenship. In a previous post we addressed some of these issues and pointed out the current limited range of responses to this challenge. We need to ask ourselves what role public education is to play in the nurturing of democratic habits. How are our schools doing when it comes to a culture and curriculum that supports democratic citizenship? What can we ask of our schools in terms of culture, organization, structure, content, and standards when it comes to educating for democratic life?

Accountability: The newest buzz-word in schooling must be accountability (followed closely by those deceptively neutral terms like "research-based" and "data-driven decision making"); but accountability seems to be nothing more than meeting cut-off scores on tests which have only a dubious connection to the lives we hope our children live. We need to be asking what it means to be accountable when it comes to our schools — that is, accountable to whom and for what? How can we insure that those closest to our children (parents and teachers) are able to give a clear account of what is being learned and why? How do we hold our civic leaders to account for the share of resources that our children receive through their schools?

Education vs Schooling: Our public schools are only the most formal of our educational institutions. We need to look more broadly at all of the educative experiences our children have, and of the lives they live that make it possible for them to benefit from those experiences. What should be done to secure childhoods that are healthy, free from want and fear, and enriching so that every child is equally capable of a life of learning and democratic participation? How do we utilize the public airwaves as a source of public information? What public educational institutions (libraries for example) can we provide for all citizens?

Questions like these demonstrate the complexity of on-going school renewal. No single policy endeavor, no matter how well-meaning or well-funded, will insure success. Rather, it will take democratic engagement on behalf of democracy itself to see that the education of future generations prepares them for a life of self-governance. This engagement is the mission of The Forum and we invite you to continue to be a part of our work.