Mixed local reaction to Obama education changes
A proposed revision of the federal government's flagship effort to improve schools would ease the burden most of them face in trying to pass annual benchmark tests, compared with the current No Child Left Behind law.
But the Obama administration's plan would impose stiff sanctions on a relatively small number of persistently low-achieving schools. Such schools, including some in Philadelphia, would be restructured.
The Elementary and Secondary Education Act overhaul "blueprint," released earlier this month, has yet to be introduced as legislation; many details have not been completed.
No Child Left Behind, passed in 2001, has become a fixture in the education landscape. It requires students to take annual proficiency tests. Schools face sanctions if all students or those in certain categories - learning disabled, minorities, English Language Learners, or economically disadvantaged - don't do well.
Schools rated as "failing" have to allow students to transfer, must use some federal funding for tutoring, and will get increased state oversight.
All children are supposed to meet state standards by 2014, a goal widely seen as unrealistic. About a quarter of Pennsylvania's 3,115 tested schools did not meet reading and math targets last year. In New Jersey, 35 percent of 2,222 schools did not make the grade.
