What's next after No Child Left Behind? Melissa Cropper, Ohio Federation of Teachers
Guest columnist Melissa Cropper is President of the Ohio Federation of Teachers, a labor union representing 20,000 members who provide quality public education and public services to Ohio children, their families and our communities. OFT is the state affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers, which represents 1.6 million members nationwide.
Standardized testing in public schools became the creature that kept growing and taking over everything in its path. Educators, parents, students and others concerned about its effect on actual teaching and learning led a revolt—with hundreds of thousands of parents across the country even opting their children out of taking the tests.
Melissa Cropper is president of the Ohio Federation of Teachers.
Congress listened, and it may soon be putting up a "going out of business sign" when it comes to the federal government telling states how to hold educators accountable to identify struggling schools and determine which interventions can be used to help those schools turn around.
So what does this mean for all stakeholders after years of federal mandates under the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act and Race to the Top grants to states? Both houses of Congress have now passed bills to overhaul NCLB. Because of some major differences between the bills, House and Senate conferees will have to reconcile those differences before seeking President Obama's signature.
Given its content and overwhelming bipartisan support, we hope that conferees will use the Senate bill as the foundation of a final agreement. The good news for our students, schools, educators and parents is that both the Senate and House heard the cries of discontent over the testing obsession and the misuse of high-stakes testing. Both bills stop the secretary of education from closing schools or dictating teacher evaluations and reset accountability by eliminating the test-and-punish policies that have narrowed the curriculum but not the achievement gap.
This means—if the final bill follows suit—that Ohio will be able to set our own accountability system and will no longer need to follow NCLB's rigid "adequate yearly progress" formula. This has real potential to return joy and flexibility to teaching and learning. But to make new policies meaningful, educators and parents must be partners with school leaders when developing a new accountability system.
The key difference between the Senate and House bills is over equity. Only the Senate bill protects the ESEA's original intent to mitigate the effects of poverty by targeting What's next after No Child Left Behind? Melissa Cropper, Ohio Federation of Teachers | cleveland.com: