Federal education policy is failing
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Email this ArticleIwas privileged to teach in a National Blue Ribbon School in Los Angeles during the 1990s. What is now being done to the Medford School District (reported in "Does this add up?" Nov. 11) is an abuse of the federal government's power to encourage and recognize educational excellence. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 punishes public schools for the diversity of their students' achievements.
Your lead paragraph says it well: "Students who failed state math tests at four schools have tipped the Medford School District into a punitive status known as a district 'in need of improvement' under the No Child Left Behind Act." The article explains that every subgroup of students within every Medford school must meet grade-level standards in math. Otherwise the school is labeled a failure in that subject.
If at least one elementary, one middle and one high school in the district earns that label, the entire district is put on the "needs improvement" list, and punished accordingly. In Medford's case, the issue was a handful of special needs students — some with disabilities or limited English proficiency — who did not perform at grade level in math at one elementary school. Those few students pushed the whole school district into its current negative designation, despite all its students' achievements.
I taught pre-algebra and algebra 1 at the Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies — or LACES — a public magnet