As a non-teaching major who taught high school for two years, I have to say that NCLB has a couple of good impacts:
1, It requires schools and districts to look at teacher’s subject matter competence. In Alaska, You have to pass the Praxis I test now, and many veteran teachers could not. This is 10th grade reading writing and math.
For you subject areas, you have to pass the appropriate Praxis II tests. I passed Geography, Physical Science and General Science,and so was “Highly Qualified” to teach these subjects. You would be amazed at how many education majors can’t pass such tests.
2, It makes them re-examine social promotion. If you have a critical test in the 10th grade, or 8th grade, do you promote kids into these grades to screw up the tests? Currently, the answer is still yes, but slowly changing. We had a kid who attended about 2 weeks of 7th grade, yet got promoted to 8th. If NCLB provides motivation for schools to end that practice, then more power to it.
Ultimately, the problem in schools is not money, we all know that. The problem is crappy parenting, no good male role models for the kids in the homes and schools in too many cases, and kids who lack the discipline (and parenting) to buckle down and do work that doesn’t involve instant gratification or Disney-like entertainment.
I hope that someday we can also move back to having expert special-ed teachers teach special ed students, because nothing is as pointless as trying to teach Sophomore physical science to 20 kids that range from a 10th grade to 2nd grade reading level. They ALL get short-changed.
