NCLB Waivers are not Worthy Reforms in California
A slightly abbreviated version of this post ran as an op-ed column in yesterday's Sacramento Bee.
No Child Left Behind has put the schools of California in a vise. Next year, the vast majority of our schools will be declared "failing" based on our inability to make every child in the state proficient on standardized tests. As of last year, there were already almost 1,300 schools in year five of program improvement, meaning they will need to be radically restructured to satisfy the law. The Department of Education has created a waiver process however, which would allow our schools to continue to receive funding, which some Californians support.
Unfortunately, the new mandates being demanded in exchange for a waiver from NCLB simply trade one set of poor policies for another. In a time when the number of districts at risk of insolvency has tripled, the conditions
