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Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Schools Matter: Guest Post: NCLB's Faith-Based Reforms, a Post Mortem

Schools Matter: Guest Post: NCLB's Faith-Based Reforms, a Post Mortem:

Guest Post: NCLB's Faith-Based Reforms, a Post Mortem

Dr. John Thompson was an award-winning historian, lobbyist, and guerilla-gardener who became an award-winning inner city teacher after crack and gangs hit his neighborhood.By John Thompson

No Child Left Behind, like the War in Iraq and "Voo Doo" economics is a part of the American tradition of "the Power of Positive Thinking." If teachers really believed that "every child can learn," said the law's authors, revitalized schools would undo the legacies of Jim Crow and poverty. It is thus fitting that we celebrate NCLB's tenth anniversary with the words of Adlai Stevenson, "I find Saint Paul appealing and Saint Peale appalling."

Educationally, NCLB was a faith-based law that attributed schools' problems to "the benign bigotry of low expectations." It proclaimed that "No Excuses!," "High Expectations!," and an attitude of "Whatever It Takes!" could undo concentrations of poverty. An unholy coalition (or should I say an overly holy coalition?) of the left and the right agreed that the horrific