NSBA’s bill to improve the No Child Left Behind Act 

The California School Boards Association, after hearing about the difficulties local school districts are having implementing the No Child Left Behind Act, provided considerable policy and regulatory input to the bill the National School Boards Association is proposing to amend NCLB. The bill identifies several changes that need to be made in the law:

• Redefine “adequate yearly progress” to more accurately measure the progress of specific groups of students, and recognize conditions and circumstances not currently addressed.
• Strengthen the connection between sanctions and what needs to be done to improve student achievement.
• Give the Secretary of Education more authority to approve state plans with alternate methods of measuring AYP; allow states to use their own accountability systems; give states more flexibility to adjust their NCLB plans.
• Defer costly corrective actions if federal Title I funding has not increased by $2.5 billion that year, or if special education funding has not increased as authorized in 2004.

Some of the particulars of the changes fall into the following areas:

Measuring Adequate Yearly Progress

• Adjust subgroup sizes and AYP targets as appropriate to account for size of school and student needs.
• Ensure students are counted only once if they fall into more than one subgroup.
• Expand the basic AYP measurement to include other approaches.
• Allow certain students, with parent consent, exemption from testing without affecting the participation rate.
• Test up to 2 percent of students with disabilities in accord with their Individual Education Program.

State flexibility

• Allow the Secretary of Education to grant waivers for requirements that are unnecessarily burdensome or duplicate state requirements.

Implementation of sanctions

• Sanctions should apply only when the same subgroup fails on the same indicator for two years.
• Severe sanctions should not apply unless more than 35 percent of the school or district’s enrollment scores less than proficient.
• Make transfer options available only to those in a failing group, not the entire school.
• Limit a district’s financial obligations for transportation costs.
• Add several conditions that exempt districts from offering transfers.
• Offer supplemental services in first year of Program Improvement.

Non-public schools

• Give students receiving Title I benefits in a non-public setting the same assessments as public school students, and stop funding schools whose Title I students do not make adequate progress.

Efforts are currently underway to inform members of Congress about the bill and the needed changes it includes so that the appropriate author may be found to carry it.

Source: National School Boards Association