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No Child Left Behind and education outcomes: Research roundup

Studies analyzing the impact of the No Child Left Behind Act on student and school performance.

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by Margaret Weigel, The Journalist's Resource August 25, 2011

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The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act was intended to promote higher levels of performance in U.S. public education by tying a school’s federal funding directly to student achievement as measured by standardized test scores. Ten years after its implementation, however, research on NCLB suggests that the achievement levels of the nation’s students, teachers and school districts remain significantly below established benchmarks. In August 2011, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, describing the Act as “a slow-motion train wreck,” suspended the requirement that all students be proficient in math and reading by 2014, and invited states to apply for a waiver of NCLB’s proficiency requirements.

The following studies analyze issues related to NCLB, and look at the law’s effects on student and school performance.

“The Impact of No Child Left Behind on Student Achievement”

Journal of Policy Analysis and Management , 2011

Findings: “Our results indicate that NCLB generated statistically significant increases in the average math performance of fourth graders … as well as improvements at the lower and top percentiles. There is also evidence of improvements in eighth-grade math achievement, particularly among traditionally low-achieving groups and at the lower percentiles. However, we find no evidence that NCLB increased fourth-grade reading achievement.”

“Incentives and Test-Based Accountability in Education”

U.S. National Research Council, 2011

Findings: “Test-based incentive programs, as designed and implemented in the programs that have been carefully studied, have not increased student achievement enough to bring the United States close to the levels of the highest achieving countries. When evaluated using relevant low-stakes tests, which are less likely to be inflated by the incentives themselves, the overall effects on achievement tend to be small and are effectively zero for a number of programs. Even when evaluated using the tests attached to the incentives, a number of programs show only small effects.”

“Performance Effects of Failure to Make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP): Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity Framework”

Economics of Education Review , 2011

Findings: “Using panel data on Maryland elementary and middle schools from 2003 through 2009, I find that the scope of failure matters: Academic performance suffers in the short run in response to school-wide failure. However, schools that meet achievement targets for the aggregate student group, yet fail to meet at least one demographic subgroup’s target see between 3 and 6 percent more students in the failing subgroup score proficiently in the following year, compared to if no accountability pressure were in place.”

“Exacerbating Inequality: The Failed Promise of the No Child Left Behind Act” (PDF)

Race Ethnicity and Education, 2007

Findings: “ NCLB received and continues to receive support, in part because it promises to improve student learning and to close the achievement gap between White students and students of color. However, NCLB has failed to live up to its promises and may exacerbate inequality. Furthermore, by focusing on education as the solution to social and economic inequality, it diverts the public’s attention away from the issues such as poverty, lack of decent paying jobs and health care, that need to be confronted if inequality is to be reduced.”

“The No Child Left Behind Act: Have Federal Funds Been Left Behind? ” (PDF)

Public Finance Review, 2008

Findings: “We find that new federal funding is sufficient to support very low standards for student performance, but cannot come close to funding high standards without implausibly large increases in school-district efficiency… [S]tates have a strong incentive to keep their standards low.”

“Gauging Growth: How to Judge No Child Left Behind?” (PDF)

Educational Researcher , 2007

Findings: “Focusing on the performance of fourth graders, where gains have been strongest since the early 1970s, the authors find that earlier test score growth has largely faded since enactment of NCLB in 2002. Gains in math achievement have persisted in the post-NCLB period, albeit at a slower rate of growth. Performance in many states continues to apparently climb. But the bar defining proficiency is set much lower in most states, compared with the NAEP [National Assessment of Educational Progress] definition, and the disparity between state and federal results has grown since 2001. Progress seen in the 1990s in narrowing achievement gaps has largely disappeared in the post-NCLB era.”

Tags: children, schools, research roundup, campaign issue, youth

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Margaret Weigel

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The Effects of No Child Left Behind on the Prevalence of Evidence-Based Drug Prevention Curricula in the Nation’s Middle Schools *

Chris ringwalt.

a Senior Research Scientist, Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, 1516 East Franklin Street, Suite 200 Chapel Hill, NC 27514

Sean Hanley

b Research Associate, Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, 1516 East Franklin Street, Suite 200, Chapel Hill, NC 27514

Susan T. Ennett

c Associate Professor, Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 358A Rosenau Hall, Chapel Hill, NC 27599

Amy A. Vincus

d Associate Research Scientist, Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, 1516 East Franklin Street, Suite 200, NC 27514

J. Michael Bowling

e Research Associate Professor, Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, University of North Carolinaat Chapel Hill, 312 Rosenau Hall, Chapel Hill, NC 27599

Susan W. Haws

f Research Assistant, Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 358A Rosenau Hall, NC 27599

Louise A. Rohrbach

g Associate Professor of Research, Department of Preventive Medicine, Institute for Prevention Research, University of Southern California, 1000 S. Fremont Ave., Unit #8, Alhambra, CA 91803

Concerns have been expressed that No Child Left Behind (NCLB) may be reducing the amount of classroom time devoted to subjects other than those for which students are tested. The purpose of this article is to explore whether NCLB legislation has affected the provision of evidence-based drug prevention curricula (EBC) in the nation’s middle schools, a subject area that is not assessed by standardized tests.

Data were collected in spring 2005 and spring 2008 from a nationally representative sample of middle schools. Respondents completed a survey regarding their provision of EBC (2005 response rate: 78.1%). We also collected data on schools’ adequate yearly progress (AYP) status as of 2005 as a measure of their compliance with NCLB targets. We restricted our sample to schools that responded to our survey in both waves (n = 1324, or 76.9% of those schools responding in 2005) and conducted logistic regression analyses to determine whether those schools not making AYP in 2005 were less likely to be using an EBC in 2008.

Our results revealed no relationship between AYP status in 2005 and EBC use in 2008. Analyses of demographic characteristics showed that schools making AYP were more likely to be small and rural, and to serve majority White student populations whose families were characterized by lower levels of poverty.

CONCLUSIONS

Our failure to find any relationship between AYP status and the provision of EBC suggests that concerns about the potential adverse effects of NCLB on drug use prevention have yet to be validated. Implications of our results are discussed.

Concerns have been expressed that the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act may be reducing the amount of classroom time devoted to subjects other than those for which schools are held responsible, namely math, science, and reading. 1 To the extent that the concern is accurate, schools—and especially those that are not performing well—may be “narrowing the curriculum” 2 by allocating resources and time away from school health, physical education, and other extracurricular activities. 2 – 11 However, available trend data that speak to potential adverse effects of NCLB on schools’ provision of health education content are scant, ambiguous, and contradictory. The purpose of this paper is to explore whether NCLB legislation has affected the provision of evidence-based drug prevention curricula in the nation’s middle schools, a subject area that is not assessed by standardized tests. These curricula typically require between 8 and 15 class periods to administer, and thus may impose considerable demands on schools’ limited classroom time. The link between drug use and academic performance, however, is well established and a number of studies have shown that drug use may serve as a risk factor for poor academic performance. 12 – 14 Neglecting evidence-based strategies for drug use prevention, therefore, would be counter productive to schools’ efforts to improve academic achievement.

Originally passed in 2001 as a reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the primary objective of NCLB 15 is to enhance students’ learning and academic achievement. The law gives particular emphasis to reducing disparities in students’ performance among key subgroups, as defined by poverty, racial or ethnic minority status, English language proficiency, and special needs. The intent of the law is to ensure that all students score at a basic level of proficiency by 2014, and test standards are required to rise each year to ensure that this goal is met. 16 Accountability systems have been established in all of the states, each of which has developed its own set of procedures to determine whether its schools are making adequate yearly progress (AYP) by means of their students’ scores on standardized tests. All states now make available lists of schools that are not making satisfactory progress, and parents are given the option of transferring their children elsewhere. Those schools not making AYP for 2 consecutive years face increasing levels of sanctions in subsequent years, ranging from the development of a school improvement plan to the initiation of school restructuring. As of the 2005–2006 school year, 17% of all public schools were not making AYP; 17 by 1 year later, that proportion had increased to almost 20%. 16 Given the threat of school restructuring that is built into NCLB, it is reasonable to assume that administrators and teachers in schools that are failing to make AYP are concerned about their tenure, and that they may as a result be narrowing the curriculum to concentrate their schools’ resources on “teaching to the test.” 18

Empirical evidence that NCLB has actually attenuated school time devoted to subjects other than math, science, and reading is scant. A study of NCLB’s effects in Chicago Public Schools, published in 2003, found that the resources devoted to non-tested material seemed to be decreasing over time. 19 Data from the Schools and Staffing Survey of the US Department of Education indicated a modest reduction between 1987 and 2003 in the amount of time that elementary school teachers were spending on social studies, and a concomitant increase in time devoted to math and English. The same study yielded no evidence, however, of curriculum narrowing in middle schools. 20 More recently, results from a survey conducted in 2007 of 349 nationally representative school districts suggested that 49% had reduced the amount of time allocated in their elementary schools for physical education, art and music, science and social studies, and recess. At the same time, 62% were spending more time on English or mathematics. 21 On the other hand, an analysis of annual iterations of the Monitoring the Future survey does not reveal any marked decline in instructional time following the passage of NCLB in 2001 for subject areas not tested, even in middle schools where testing is most pronounced. 20

In regards to instructional time related to the field of health education, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention-sponsored School Health Policies and Procedures Survey suggest that the median number of hours that middle school teachers devoted to drug use prevention increased from 4.0 in 2000 to 5.5 in 2006, and hours allocated to sexually transmitted disease prevention increased from 1.3 to 1.8. On the other hand, the hours devoted to injury prevention and safety decreased from 3.6 to 1.8 during the same time period, whereas time spent on violence prevention decreased from 4.0 to 2.5 hours. Similar trends were observed in high schools, where the amount of time spent on teaching drug use and pregnancy prevention increased, whereas time allocated to injury prevention, safety, and violence prevention decreased. 22 , 23

Among the many provisions of NCLB is a requirement that schools that receive money from the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools of the US Department of Education administer evidence-based strategies that address drug and violence prevention, 15 or face losing their funding. 24 Given that nearly all districts in the United States receive Safe and Drug-Free Schools funding, 25 , 26 this is likely to be a salient concern for most districts and their associated schools. In 1999, 2005, and 2008, this article’s authors conducted a survey of a nationally representative sample of schools with middle school grades, the primary purpose of which was to determine the proportion that were using evidence-based curricula (EBC) as specified in any of several national registries of such curricula. Although we did not observe a significant increase in use of EBC from 2005 to 2008, 27 data from our 2005 study indicated that 42.6% of the nation’s middle schools were using at least one EBC, and 22.7% of respondents were using an EBC most frequently , while the remaining schools relied on curricula or other content related to drug prevention that lacked evidence of effectiveness. 28 These figures represent a signficant increase as compared with baseline data that we collected in 1999 concerning schools’ use of at least one EBC, 28 which indicate that they began implementing EBC in larger numbers leading up to and immediately following the passing of the NCLB legislation in 2001. This trend may be attributable to the provisions of the Principles of Effectiveness that were promulgated in 1998 and later enshrined in NCLB legislation, and that require the use of EBC in schools receiving support from the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools.

Capitalizing on the longitudinal nature of our repeated surveys of drug prevention practices in the nation’s middle schools, we examined the relationship between schools’ AYP status and their subsequent use of evidence-based drug use prevention curricula. Specifically, we were interested in learning whether schools that were failing to make AYP in 2005 would be less likely than those making AYP to use EBC 3 years later, because school administrators were devoting their resources and classroom time to bring their schools into compliance with the demands of NCLB. Therefore we hypothesized that relative to schools that were making AYP in 2005, those that were not making AYP that year would be less likely to:

• continue using EBC in 2008 if they were using EBC in 2005, and
• adopt EBC by 2008 if they were not using EBC in 2005.

We utilized data from our longitudinal study of a large nationally representative sample of the nation’s middle schools conducted in 2005 and repeated in 2008, the primary purpose of which was to assess the prevalence of evidence-based drug prevention curricula. Within the 2005 sample, we identified whether each school was (1) using such curricula and (2) making AYP. We then determined which schools were using EBC 3 years later. Analyses pertinent to the first hypothesis utilized data from schools using EBC in 2005; those concerning the second hypothesis pertained to schools not using EBC that year.

Data come from the School-Based Substance Use Prevention Programs Study, a nationwide survey of drug prevention activities in the nation’s middle schools conducted in 1999, 2005, and 2008. The sample for the original survey, conducted in 1999, utilized a 1997–1998 sampling frame from Quality Education Data, Inc., 29 which comprised all regular schools in the 50 states and the District of Columbia with middle school grades. We defined eligible schools as those that included grades 7 or 8, or were limited either to the sixth grade or to the fifth and sixth grades. We excluded schools with fewer than 20 students and those that focused exclusively on special education or vocational development. The sampling frame yielded 2273 eligible public schools. 30 For the 2005 survey, we supplemented the 1999 sample with 210 additional schools selected from a 2002 to 2003 sampling frame supplied by the Common Core of Data 31 to account for schools that opened between 1999 and 2003. Given the high variability of the characteristics of middle schools across the country, we stratified our samples with equal probability within each stratum, to ensure adequate representation of schools along 3 key charactistics: population density, school size, and poverty level. The purpose of stratifying was to reduce sampling error and thus increase the precision of our estimates.

Between October 2004 and January 2005, before the 2005 survey data collection, we contacted all schools (n = 2483) to confirm their status, a process that yielded 2204 schools that met our eligibility criteria. The residual (n = 279) was considered ineligible either because of their grade span, school type, and school size, or because the school had closed in the interim. We also excluded those schools that indicated that they had no staff whatsoever who taught drug prevention content. We conducted a similar screening procedure before the 2008 survey data collection to verify schools’ eligibility status. Our analyses are restricted to those schools that responded to the survey in both 2005 and 2008 (n = 1324).

Instruments

In the 2005 and 2008 survey administrations, we asked respondents to indicate which of 26 drug prevention curricula, if any, they taught in their school’s middle school grades during the current school year. We then asked them which of the curricula they used most frequently. Respondents also identified in an open-ended field the names of any curricula we did not specify. Respondents who completed the survey by telephone identified which curicula they used most frequently and their responses were then coded into our list of curricula. Copies of our instruments are available from the first author.

For the purposes of this paper, we consider EBC to be those curricula that were designed to prevent drug use, targeted a universal population of middle school students, were commercially available as of the 2004–2005 school year, and were identified as evidence-based as of 2004 on any of 3 national registries. Our list of EBC included those identified as: “model” or “effective” by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s National Registry of Evidence-Based Programs and Practices; 32 as “model” or “promising” by “Blueprints for Violence Prevention,” 33 or as “exemplary” by the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools. 34 Collectively, these reviews identified the following 10 curricula as EBC: All Stars, keepin’ it REAL, Life Skills Training, Lions Quest Skills for Adolescence, Positive Action, Project ALERT, Project Northland, Project TNT, Social Competence Promotion Program for Young Adolescents, and Too Good for Drugs. The remaining 16 curricula were not evidence-based.

The survey data used in these analyses were collected from January to July of 2005 and again in 2008 from the person considered to be the most knowledgeable about drug use prevention in each eligible school—that is, the individual with the most knowledge and understanding of the school’s drug prevention activities. This individual was identified during the screening procedures used to identify schools’ eligibility status. We directed our invitation to participate in the study to this individual. In neither 2005 nor 2008 did we attempt to return to the respondent for the previous iteration, but instead sought to identify the most qualified person to complete our survey.

In 2005 we utilized 3 sequential survey data collection modes to maximize our response rate. All respondents were initially invited by letter to complete a 40–45 minute survey via a secure Web site, for which they were provided a prepaid $10 cash incentive. Respondents who did not complete the Web survey after repeated contacts received a paper copy of the survey along with a postage-paid return envelope. Those who failed to complete the paper survey were contacted for a brief interview. Altogether, 65.2% of the sample responded by Web, 18.9% by paper, and 15.9% by phone, which yielded a total response rate of 78.1% (n = 1721). We proceeded in a similar fashion for the third administration of the survey except that we dispensed with the paper version. Of the 1721 responding schools in 2005, 1324 (76.9%) schools completed the survey in 2008, 83.2% by Web and the remainder (16.8%) by phone.

In addition, we collected data concerning each school’s AYP status as of the 2004–2005 school year from Web sites maintained by its respective state or from an associated organization, such as a university. We then coded each school as making or not making AYP based on its state’s designation. For 18 schools that were not included on their state’s list, we contacted the associated school district to determine the school’s status as of 2004–2005. In the case of 4 states for which data were unavailable online, we sent a list of the schools in our sample to a state-level contact, who then identified the AYP status for each school. For 2 states reporting that they did not assess AYP status for the 2004–2005 school year, we determined the status as of the previous year for the 15 schools they contributed to the sample. We were unable to code AYP status for a total of 14 of our schools, which we excluded from our analysis file. In 8 cases, the school did not have an AYP status because its enrollment was too low to be assessed, whereas in another 4 cases the school did not contain grades for which students were assessed. The remaining 2 schools did not have an AYP status because they had been restructured.

We also secured from the 2004 to 2005 school Common Core of Data (CCD) data file 35 information concerning each school’s size and racial/ethnic composition, as well as the population density of the area in which the school was located and the proportion of its students who were eligible for a free or reduced-priced lunch, which we used as a proxy for poverty level.

Data Analysis

All analyses were conducted in SAS 9.1 (SAS Institute, Inc, Cary, NC) using weighted data and procedures that accounted for the study’s complex sampling design. Sample weights were constructed from original probabilities of selection computed on the 1999 sample, 36 in conjunction with probabilities of selecting new schools from the 2002 sample.

To assess the comparability of our analysis sample (ie, those responding to our survey in both 2005 and 2008) with those schools that only responded in 2005, we conducted Rao-Scott chi-square tests to determine whether there were differences in 2005 AYP status, population density, student poverty status, school size, and the race/ethnicity of the majority of the student population as reported on the 2004–2005 CCD. We next screened our data with respect to our questions regarding curriculum use and eliminated 6 cases for inconsistent responses, yielding a final analysis sample of 1318.

We followed these analyses by computing the number and percentage of schools that used an EBC in 2008 as a function of their AYP status in 2005, for each of our 2 hypotheses, the first of which pertains to the subset of schools using EBC in 2005, and the second to the subset of schools not using them that year. This allowed us to conduct a preliminary examination of the nature of the relationship between AYP and EBC status for each of our hypotheses.

We then employed Rao-Scott chi-square tests to identify demographic characteristics that distinguished those schools that made AYP in 2005 from those that did not. The purpose of these analyses was to describe contextual differences in these 2 groups of schools and to identify characteristics that had the potential to confound the relationship between schools’ AYP status and their use of EBC.

For our final analyses, we created 2 strata based on use of an EBC in 2005, which allowed us to test our 2 hypotheses. We then ran a series of logistic regression models for each stratum using the SURVEYLOGISTIC procedure in SAS. We first regressed 2008 EBC status on 2005 AYP status, then regressed 2008 EBC status on each demographic characteristic that distinguished between those making and not making AYP in 2005 identified in the preceding analysis. We concluded with a full model that regressed 2008 EBC status on 2005 AYP status controlling for the demographic characteristics. For these analyses, we coded schools’ EBC and AYP status in such a manner that those not using 1 of the 10 specified EBC most frequently, and those making AYP, were scored 0 on these 2 dummy variables; that is, they served as referents. Using this coding scheme, we expected to see odds ratios less than 1.0 if our hypotheses were supported.

Our comparison of the AYP status and demographic characteristics of the schools responding and not responding to our survey in 2008 revealed one difference in that responding schools were more likely to be large ( χ 2 [2 df] = 15.02, p < .001). Table 1 presents the distribution of our sample along dimensions of EBC use and AYP status. As can be seen for both schools using and not using an EBC most frequently in 2005, similar proportions of schools used an EBC in 2008 regardless of their AYP status in 2005.

The Relationship Between Schools’ 2005 AYP Status and Primary Use of EBC in 2008 (n = 1242) *

AYP, adequate yearly progress; EBC, evidence-based curricula.

The results of our demographic comparisons between schools making and not making AYP in 2005 are presented in Table 2 . Schools making AYP were more likely to be small ( χ 2 [2 df] = 85.28, p < .001) and rural ( χ 2 [2 df] = 60.18, p < .001), and to serve majority White student populations ( χ 2 [4 df] = 87.64, p < .001) whose families were characterized by lower levels of poverty ( χ 2 [2 df] = 60.46, p < .001).

Characteristics of Schools by AYP Status as of 2005 (n = 1304) †

AYP, adequate yearly progress.

In regards to our 2 hypotheses, our logistic regression analyses ( Table 3 ) revealed no significant relationships between AYP status in 2005 and the use of an EBC in 2008 in either stratum. Among those using an EBC in 2005, those not making AYP in 2005 were as likely to continue using an EBC in 2008 as those who made AYP in 2005 (adjusted odds ratio (AOR) = 0.88, p > .05). Likewise, among those not using an EBC in 2005, those not making AYP were as likely to initiate use of an EBC by 2008 as those who made AYP in 2005 (AOR = 1.26, p > .05).

Relationship Between AYP Status in 2005, School Sociodemographic Characteristics, and Primary Use of EBC in 2008, Among Schools Using and Not Using an EBC Most Frequently in 2005 §

OR, odds ratio; AOR, adjusted odds ratio; AYP, adequate yearly progress; EBC, evidence-based curricula.

In this study, we found no support for the concern that schools not making annual yearly progress in 2005, relative to those doing so, would be less likely to continue using, or to initiate the use of, evidence-based drug prevention curricula in 2008. Thus, neither of our hypotheses was supported. That said, we should point out that the same NCLB legislation that requires schools to reach annually escalating AYP targets also mandates that schools use evidence-based drug and violence prevention programs or risk losing their funding. 24 It is thus possible that schools not making AYP were at least partially deterred from eliminating their use of EBC for fear of suffering further negative consequences. If so, school health education curricula that address topic areas other than drugs and violence may be more vulnerable.

Our study has yielded data that suggest major differences between schools that made and did not make AYP in 2005. The former was much more likely to be small, located in rural relative to urban areas, and to comprise students who were White and from more affluent families. These findings serve as yet another reminder of the profound sociodemographic and contextual differences between schools that are and are not making AYP, and of the enormity of the task required to assist failing schools. Students are expected to achieve ever escalating levels of proficiency if they are to reach full proficiency in 2014, and schools with heterogeneous student populations have even more AYP benchmarks to meet than those serving homogenous populations.

Limitations

The interpretation of study findings should be tempered by a few concerns. First, although the basis on which we judged drug prevention curricula as effective was sound in 2005, it was less so in 2008. In the interim, the National Registry of Effective Prevention Programs and Practices, which yielded the majority of curricula we specified as evidence-based, changed its rating system. Although in 2005 it recognized programs as “model” if they satisfied 6 methodological criteria and yielded positive outcomes, by 2008 it had changed to a report of ratings for each of the criteria, and thus the classification of “model” no longer existed as such. For the purposes of this paper, we simply considered all curricula that were rated as evidence-based in 2005 to continue to be so in 2008.

Second, we learned during the course of data collection concerning schools’ AYP status in 2005 that the states vary considerably in the proficiency targets they set for their schools each year; thus scores on standardized tests that are considered acceptable in 1 state may be indicative of school failure in another. We do not believe that this variation affects the validity of our main findings related to the effects of AYP on the implementation of EBC, because it was the failure to make AYP per se that appeared likely to induce schools to concentrate their resources on the subjects for which they would be held responsible, irrespective of the criteria used to judge AYP. However, these varying criteria across states are likely to have introduced some error in the ancillary findings we reported concerning school characteristics related to AYP status. On the other hand, those findings were so robust—all were significant at p < .0001—that any error introduced is likely to be minor.

Third, we recognize that schools’ AYP status may fluctuate from year to year, and that some schools that did not make AYP in 2005 may well have been restored to good standing by 2008. However, we were precluded by available study resources from determing which of our participating schools were making AYP as of 2008. Furthermore, this information was not directly related to our hypotheses, which concerned whether schools’ AYP status as of 2005 affected their use of EBC 3 years later. It seems reasonable to expect that administrators in schools that did not make AYP in 2005 would remain sensitive to the possibility that they might fail again, particularly given the annual rise in proficiency benchmarks required by NCLB, and would likely continue any curricular changes and other modifications to their teaching practices made in response to their failure to make AYP in 2005.

This study is the first to examine, within the context of a large longitudinal sample, the effects of AYP status on the provision of evidence-based drug prevention curricula. Our failure to find any relationship between AYP status and the provision of EBC suggests that concerns about the potential adverse effects of NCLB on youth drug use prevention have yet to be validated. This issue should be explored further within the context of other longitudinal studies of trends in the time allotted to health education content in the nation’s schools, which take into account the schools’ AYP status. Given the amply demonstrated relationship between substance use and academic performance, we are pleased to have found that the 2 key elements of NCLB legislation discussed here do not appear to be mitigating against one another.

IMPLICATIONS FOR SCHOOL HEALTH

Although pressure on schools to devote time and resources to achieve or maintain AYP is great, particularly in light of escalating benchmarks and sanctions, we believe that the provision of evidence-based strategies for the prevention of youth drug use is synergistic with this goal. Research on the connection between educational success and drug use has generated a large body of literature, with some debate as to whether drug use causes poorer educational outcomes or vice versa. Using data from Monitoring the Future, a nationwide study of drug use and other behaviors among middle and high school students, Bachman and colleagues 12 found that although the evidence suggests that educational failure leads to subsequent drug use, the converse may be true as well; that is, drug use may cause poor educational outcomes. Providing students with effective drug prevention programming may, therefore, support schools’ efforts to achieve the academic goals required by NCLB. Although our study does not allow us to test this notion, we hope that our results are an indication that schools recognize the interrelationship between drug use and academic achievement and are not narrowing the curriculum accordingly. As schools struggle to allocate time and resources toward achieving academic goals, we hope that they continue to recognize the important role that drug prevention plays in their students’ academic lives.

In particular, we encourage schools to adopt or continue to use EBC in their provision of drug prevention education. Such curricula have been subjected to rigorous evaluations and have been shown to prevent or reduce drug use among adolescents. Our previous work 27 has shown that although most schools use some type of drug prevention curricula in middle school grades, for example, most do not use an EBC as their primary curriculum. Given the diminishing resources devoted to drug prevention that many schools face, we encourage them to devote the scarce resources they do have to strategies that have been shown to work. Doing so may not only help to ensure the health of their students, but also the academic achievement of the school.

* Indicates CHES and Nursing continuing education hours are available. Also available at: http://www.ashaweb.org/continuing_education.html

Human Subjects Approval Statement

This study was considered exempt from human subjects review by the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation’s Institutional Review Board (FWA0000 3078).

The Impact of No Child Left Behind on Students, Teachers, and Schools [with Comments and Discussion]

• The Impact of No Child Left Behind on Students, Teachers, and Schools [with Comments and Discussion] (Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, 2010, No. 2)
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Brian a. jacob and brian a. jacob walter h. annenberg professor of education policy; professor of economics, and professor of education - university of michigan, former brookings expert thomas s. dee tsd thomas s. dee professor - stanford university discussants: caroline m. hoxby and cmh caroline m. hoxby stanford university helen f. ladd helen f. ladd former brookings expert, susan b. king professor emeritus of public policy, samford school of public policy - duke university.

The controversial No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) brought test-based school accountability to scale across the United States. This study draws together results from multiple data sources to identify how the new accountability systems developed in response to NCLB have influenced student achievement, school-district finances, and measures of school and teacher practices. Our results indicate that NCLB brought about targeted gains in the mathematics achievement of younger students, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds. However, we find no evidence that NCLB improved student achievement in reading. School-district expenditure increased significantly in response to NCLB, and these increases were not matched by federal revenue. Our results suggest that NCLB led to increases in teacher compensation and the share of teachers with graduate degrees. We find evidence that NCLB shifted the allocation of instructional time toward math and reading, the subjects targeted by the new accountability systems.

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No Child Left Behind: An Overview

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When most people think about the No Child Left Behind Act, they think of two things: former President George W. Bush, and standardized testing. But the politics, policy, and history of the law are far more complicated than that.

UPDATE: NCLB has been replaced. For information about the latest education law, read our explainer on ESSA, the Every Student Succeeds Act .

The No Child Left Behind law—the 2002 update of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act—effectively scaled up the federal role in holding schools accountable for student outcomes.

In December 2015, Congress passed the Every Student Succeeds Act to replace NCLB. ESSA moved in the opposite direction—it seeks to pare back the federal role in K-12 education. For more information on ESSA, read this explainer . See also our full coverage of ESSA and what it means for states and school districts.

NCLB was the product of a collaboration between civil rights and business groups, as well as both Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill and the Bush administration, which sought to advance American competitiveness and close the achievement gap between poor and minority students and their more advantaged peers. Since 2002, it’s had an outsized impact on teaching, learning, and school improvement—and become increasingly controversial with educators and the general public.

Here are a few frequently asked questions about the law, its history, and its policy implications.

What is ESEA?

The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) was part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society program. Passed in 1965 , it created a clear role for the federal government in K-12 policy, offering more than $1 billion a year in aid under its first statutory section, known as Title I, to districts to help cover the cost of educating disadvantaged students. The law has been reauthorized and changed more than half a dozen times since that initial legislation. And, for the most part, each new iteration has sought to expand the federal role in education.

What is NCLB?

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), which passed Congress with overwhelming bipartisan support in 2001 and was signed into law by President George W. Bush on Jan. 8, 2002, is the name for the most recent update to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. The NCLB law—which grew out of concern that the American education system was no longer internationally competitive—significantly increased the federal role in holding schools responsible for the academic progress of all students. And it put a special focus on ensuring that states and schools boost the performance of certain groups of students, such as English-language learners, students in special education, and poor and minority children, whose achievement, on average, trails their peers. States did not have to comply with the new requirements, but if they didn’t, they risked losing federal Title I money.

What do states and schools actually have to do under the law?

Under the NCLB law, states must test students in reading and math in grades 3 through 8 and once in high school. And they must report the results, for both the student population as a whole and for particular “subgroups” of students, including English-learners and students in special education, racial minorities, and children from low-income families.

States were required to bring all students to the “proficient level” on state tests by the 2013-14 school year, although each state got to decide, individually, just what “proficiency” should look like, and which tests to use. (In early 2015, the deadline had passed, but no states had gotten all 100 percent of its students over the proficiency bar.)

Under the law, schools are kept on track toward their goals through a mechanism known as “adequate yearly progress” or AYP. If a school misses its state’s annual achievement targets for two years or more, either for all students or for a particular subgroup, it is identified as not “making AYP” and is subject to a cascade of increasingly serious sanctions:

• A school that misses AYP two years in a row has to allow students to transfer to a better-performing public school in the same district.
• If a school misses AYP for three years in a row, it must offer free tutoring.
• Schools that continue to miss achievement targets could face state intervention. States can choose to shut these schools down, turn them into charter schools, take them over, or use another, significant turnaround strategy.

The law also requires states to ensure their teachers are “highly qualified,” which generally means that they have a bachelor’s degree in the subject they are teaching and state certification. Beginning with the 2002-03 school year, all new teachers hired with federal Title I money had to be highly qualified. By the end of the 2005-06 school year, all school paraprofessionals hired with Title I money must have completed at least two years of college, obtained an associate’s degree or higher, or passed an evaluation to demonstrate knowledge and teaching ability. States are also supposed to ensure that “highly qualified” teachers are evenly distributed among schools with high concentrations of poverty and wealthier schools.

Jan. 8, 2002 – President George W. Bush signs the No Child Left Behind Act April 2005 – U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, who had helped shepherd the NCLB law through Congress as a top domestic policy advisor in the White House, announces plans to offer states limited flexibility from parts of the law if they could prove they were moving the needle on student achievement. Sept. 2007 – U.S. Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., one of the original architects of the NCLB law and the chairman of the House education committee, unveils the first major, comprehensive NCLB reauthorization draft bill . It ultimately fails to gain traction, thanks in part to opposition from teachers’ unions. March 2010 – The Obama administration releases its own blueprint for revising the law, which would give states much more control over how to intervene in most schools, in exchange for setting high standards and putting in place teacher evaluations based in part on student outcomes. The blueprint fails to catch fire on Capitol Hill. Fall 2011 – President Barack Obama offers states flexibility from key mandates of the NCLB law, in exchange for embracing his education redesign priorities. Meanwhile, the Senate and House education committees get moving on reauthorization measures, but neither bill ultimately makes it over the legislative finish line. June 2012 – More than half of states have been granted waivers, so the majority of the country is no longer operating under the NCLB law as written. July 2013 – The U.S. House of Representatives passes a bill to renew the NCLB law , with only Republican support. The legislation, which is never taken up by the Senate, would significantly water down the federal role in K-12 accountability. March 2015 – Most states begin applying to renew their NCLB waivers, even as Congress wrestles with a reauthorization of the law.

What are some of the main criticisms of the current law?

Major portions of the NCLB law have proven problematic, particularly as the law has matured without any congressional update or reauthorization. For instance, it’s unclear that the two main remedies for low-performing schools did much to improve student achievement. In many cases, students did not take advantage of the opportunity to transfer to another school, or get free tutoring. States and districts also had difficulty screening tutors for quality. Some districts, including Chicago, successfully petitioned to offer their own tutoring services. States also generally shied away from employing dramatic school turnaround strategies for perennially failing schools.

The NCLB law has also been criticized for growing the federal footprint in K-12 education, and for relying too heavily on standardized tests. And others say its emphasis on math and reading tests has narrowed the curriculum, forcing schools to spend less time on subjects that aren’t explicitly tested, like social studies, foreign language, and the arts.

Education advocates also claim the law has been underfunded. The original legislation called for major increases in education spending to offset the cost of reaching NCLB’s ambitious goals for student achievement, but federal spending never reached the lofty levels outlined in the law. By fiscal year 2007, for example, annual funding for the main NCLB program, Title I, was supposed to rise to $25 billion. It never got there. In fiscal year 2015, for example, Title I receives about $14.5 billion.

What’s more, many states and districts have ignored parts of the law, including the requirement to ensure that highly qualified teachers are evenly distributed between poor and wealthier schools.

In order to improve implementation of the NCLB law, President George W. Bush’s second secretary of education, Margaret Spellings, allowed states to apply to participate in pilot projects to try out changes to the law, including a growth-model pilot that let states consider student progress in rating schools instead of comparing different cohorts of students to one another.

What happened to the 2013-14 school-year deadline for all students to be “proficient”?

By 2010, it was clear that many schools were not going to meet NCLB’s achievement targets. As of that year, 38 percent of schools were failing to make adequate yearly progress, up from 29 percent in 2006. In 2011, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, as part of his campaign to get Congress to rewrite the law, issued dire warnings that 82 percent of schools would be labeled “failing” that year. The numbers didn’t turn out to be quite that high, but several states did see failure rates of more than 50 percent. In Congress, meanwhile, lawmakers saw the need for a rewrite, but were unable to bring a bill across the finish line. So that year, the Obama administration offered states a reprieve from many of the law’s mandates through a series of waivers.

What do the Obama administration’s NCLB waivers do?

What’s more, schools that don’t make AYP have to set aside a portion of their federal Title I dollars for tutoring and school choice. Schools at the point of having to offer school choice must hold back 10 percent of their Title I money. The waivers, which are now in place in 42 states, Puerto Rico, and the District of Columbia, allow states to get out from under many of the mandates of the NCLB law in exchange for embracing certain education redesign priorities. For instance, waiver states no longer have to aim toward the (now past) 2013-14 deadline for getting all students to proficiency, or offer public school choice or tutoring for schools that miss achievement targets.

In exchange, states had to agree to set standards aimed at preparing students for higher education and the workforce. Waiver states could either choose the Common Core State Standards, or get their higher education institutions to certify that their standards are rigorous enough. They also must put in place assessments aligned to those standards. And they have to institute teacher-evaluation systems that take into account student progress on state standardized tests, as well as single out 15 percent of schools for turnaround efforts or more targeted interventions.

The Obama administration has made a number of adjustments to its initial waiver requirements, especially in the area of teacher evaluation, which has been the biggest struggle for states. If the NCLB law has not been reauthorized by the time President Barack Obama leaves office, it’s not clear if a new administration will continue with the waivers or put its own accountability plan in place.

NCLB Terms to Know

Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP): The yardstick at the heart of the No Child Left Behind Act. Under the NCLB law, states must test students in math and reading in grades 3-8 and at least once in high school. Schools must report on the performance of different groups of students, such as racial minorities, as well as the student population as a whole. Students are expected to reach annual achievement targets, known as adequate yearly progress, or AYP.

Title I: The section of the law providing federal funding to school districts to educate disadvantaged children. The Title I program was initially created under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 and is now part of the No Child Left Behind Act, the most recent reauthorization of that law. Highly Qualified Teacher: Under the NCLB law, every teacher in a core content area working in a public school had to be “highly qualified” in each subject taught, by the 2005-06 school year. Under the law, highly qualified generally means that a teacher is certified and demonstrated proficiency in his or her subject matter.

Choice: Under the No Child Left Behind Act, schools that fail to make adequate yearly progress (meet achievement targets) for two years in a row must allow their students to transfer to a better-performing school in the district.

Waiver: Comprehensive flexibility that the U.S. Department of Education has granted to more than 40 states and the District of Columbia from key requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act (the current version of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act) in exchange for embracing certain Obama administration education-redesign priorities on teachers, testing, standards, and school turnarounds.

Supplemental Education Services (SES): This is the No Child Left Behind Act’s legal term for “free tutoring.” Schools that fail to make adequate yearly progress (meet achievement targets) for three consecutive years, even if it’s just for a particular subgroup of students, must offer free tutoring to all students. And schools must set aside 10 percent of their Title I funding to pay for the tutoring services. States with waivers don’t have to abide by this requirement.

Subgroups: Different groups of traditionally overlooked students, including racial minorities, students in special education, English-language learners, and low-income children. Under the NCLB law, schools must break out results on annual tests by both the student population as a whole, and these “subgroup” students. Schools that don’t meet achievement targets for subgroup students are subject to increasingly serious sanctions.

Supersubgroups: Under the Obama administration’s NCLB waivers, some states choose to combine several “subgroups” for accountability purposes, resulting in what’s known as “supersubgroups.” Some civil rights organizations say lumping together different types of students, such as English-language learners and students in special education, makes it much tougher to see how individual groups are progressing relative to other groups of students and the student population as a whole.

Focus School: A term that came about as part of the Obama administration’s No Child Left Behind Act waivers, not the original 2002 law. It refers to schools with stubborn achievement gaps or weak performance among “subgroup” students, such as English-language learners or students in special education. States must identify 10 percent of their schools as “focus” schools.

Priority School: A term that came about as part of the Obama administration’s No Child Left Behind Act waivers, not the original 2002 law. It refers to schools identified as one of the lowest performers in the state and subject to dramatic interventions, including potential leadership changes. States must identify at least 5 percent of their schools as “priority schools.”

NCLB Research and Resources

• The text of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 , including shortcuts to various parts of the bill dealing with accountability, teacher quality, and more.
• All of the information from the U.S. Department of Education about waivers from the No Child Left Behind Act , including which states have them, and what their waiver plans look like.
• “It’s All Relative: How NCLB Waivers Did, and Not Transform School Accountability,” by Anne Hyslop, who at the time was a policy analyst at the New America Foundation, but has since gone to work for the Education Department. An examination of which schools have been identified as underperforming through the Obama administration’s NCLB waivers and how accountability looks different than it did under the original NCLB law. ( View an Education Week summary. )
• “The Impact of No Child Left Behind’s Accountability Sanctions on School Performance: Regression Discontinuity Evidence from North Carolina,” by researchers Thomas Ahn and Jacob Vigdor. A look at how schools fared under NCLB’s original interventions, including public school choice and free tutoring. ( View an Education Week summary. )
• “States’ Perspectives on Waivers: Relief from NCLB, Concern about Long-term Solutions,” by Jennifer McMurrer and Nanami Yoshioka for the Center on Education Policy. An examination of state attitudes toward waivers. Highlights state’s concerns about how the waivers might effect a potential reauthorization. ( View an Education Week summary. )
• “Mapping State Proficiency Standards Onto the NAEP Scales: Variation and Change in State Standards for Reading and Mathematics, 2005-2009.” A look at how the standards and expectations set under the No Child Left Behind Act compare to those of the nation’s report card, the National Assessment for Educational Progress. ( View an Education Week summary. )

Education Issues, Explained

Education Week Resources

The latest news about the Every Student Succeeds Act including, archives, Commentaries, and special features. “Sheen Fades as NCLB Waivers Near Three Year Mark,” by Alyson Klein. Examines the promise and pitfalls of the waivers, after three years of implementation. August 2014. “NCLB Waivers: The Twists, Turns, and Terms to Know,” by Alyson Klein. An interactive look at the changes the Obama administration has made in waiver policy and implementation. August 2014. “Waiver Plans Would Scrap Parts of NCLB,” by Michele McNeil. Explores the divergent accountability systems proposed under the first round of NCLB waivers. December 2011. A comprehensive look at President George W. Bush’s legacy on education and where NCLB fits in. By David Hoff. December 2008. “Framing the Debate,” by Lynn Olson and David Hoff. An explanation of what policymakers saw as the shortfalls of the No Child Left Behind law right before it was due for a 2007 rewrite. December 2006.

How to Cite This Article Klein, A. (2015, April 10). No Child Left Behind: An Overview. Education Week . Retrieved Month Day, Year from https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/no-child-left-behind-an-overview/2015/04 Stacey Decker, Deputy Managing Editor for Digital contributed to this article.

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No Child Left Behind: Estimating the Impact on Choices and Student Outcomes

Several recent education reform measures, including the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), couple school choice with accountability measures to allow parents of children in under-performing schools the opportunity to choose higher-performing schools. We use the introduction of NCLB in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg School District to determine if the choice component had an impact on the schools parents chose and if those changed choices led to academic gains. We find that 16% of parents responded to NCLB notification by choosing schools that had on average 1 standard deviation higher average test scores than their current NCLB school. We then use the lottery assignment of students to chosen schools to test if changed choices led to improved academic outcomes. On average, lottery winners experience a significant decline in suspension rates relative to lottery losers. We also find that students winning lotteries to attend substantially better (above-median) schools experience significant gains in test scores. Because proximity to high-scoring schools drives both the probability of choosing an alternative school and the average test score at the school chosen, our results suggest that the availability of proximate and high-scoring schools is an important factor in determining the degree to which school choice and accountability programs can succeed at increasing choice and immediate academic outcomes for students at under-performing schools.

We would like to thank the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Public School District for making this project possible. We thank Joseph Altonji, Douglas Staiger, Ebonya Washington, and participants at the Yale University Labor-Public Finance Lunch and the Yale University Institution for Social and Policy Studies lunch for valuable comments. We gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Smith Richardson Foundation and the Yale University Institution for Social and Policy Studies. The views expressed herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.

MARC RIS BibTeΧ

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• No Child Left Behind Rules Raise Student Performance Author(s): Justine S. Hastings Jeffrey M. Weinstein The simplified NCLB notification doubled the fraction of parents choosing a different school...The students who gained admission to...

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No child left behind Research Paper

Introduction, impact of the law, works cited.

As one of the federal government’s most sweeping changes to education in a generation, the No Child Left behind Act (NCLB) was signed into law by President George W. Bush on January 8, 2002. This bill provides nearly $1 billion a year over the next five years to strengthen public schools (FDOE 1).

This research paper explores the Act, answering questions that are aimed at gathering sufficient and relevant information within the context of the research topic. Some of the issues covered in include an explanation of the law, the impact of the law and adaptation of various systems to accommodate the law.

Abbreviated as NCLB, No Child Left Behind is an Act of Congress in the United States which revolves around the accessibility and quality of education by children in public schools around the country. Although the bill was ratified by President Obama, it is important to note that it was initially proposed when George W. Bush became the President of the United States (Bagley 1).

At the time of its proposal, the bill received an overwhelming majority support in the Congress, probably because of the expected impact it was to have in transforming the education sector.

Principally, NCLB encourages reforms, which are based on high standards that are viewed as fundamental requirements of improving the outcomes of the education system. The bill further emphasizes the need of developing basic skills among students in public schools. As a result, states are supposed to have ways of assessing these skills among students in every grade for them to qualify for state funding (Bagley 1).

However, the act does not set expected national standards and allows states to set their own standards based on a wide range of factors that may vary from one state to another. Because of the implications of the bill to the entire education system, funding allocation has continuously been rising since 2001. Another important point notable from the bill is its recognition of good performance among students as a proof of the work done by individual teachers in different schools.

As a result, Adequate Yearly Progress is essential, especially for those schools around the country that are recognized under title “I” as defined in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. If a school experience recurring poor results yearly, the act recommends several steps to be implemented in improving the standards of the school to a reasonable level recognized by the state (NEA 1).

In line with Adequate Yearly Progress, schools which experience poor performance in two years consecutively are considered to be in need of improvement and are expected to come up with an improvement plan that would run for two years for those subjects which the schools seem not to be teaching well.

Additionally, students are given an option of seeking to transfer to another better school as long as the school does exist in his or her district (NEA 1). In the event the school does not realize AYP for the third year, the act recommends that such schools should establish free tutoring programmes with an aim of helping poor-performing students.

On the other hand, a “correction” is recommended for a school that fails to attain the AYP for the fourth year. This action may include overall replacement of teachers, replacement of the existing curriculum and an allowance to have affected students spend more time in class.

In extreme and almost impossible case, schools failing for the sixth year are put under reconstruction as provided in the No Child Left Behind Act. In balancing, the bill with its practical applicability, it is the responsibility of the state to ensure that every school has qualified teachers. Additionally, a “one high standard” is supposed to be set for all students, and every state is mandated to decide this kind of standard. However, all outlined standards of the education curriculum have to be applied to all students equally around the state (NEA 1).

The law is believed to have a significant impact in the entire education sector. This impact has been felt by both teachers, students, districts and all education stakeholders. The first implication of the No Child Left Behind Bill is increased accountability required of all public schools and teachers around the country (NEA 1).

According to the bill, every school must show quantifiable improvement in the performance of students in order to prove its efforts throughout every fiscal year. This is accompanied by measures discussed above that mainly affect non-performing schools and teachers (U.S. Department of Education 1).

The law further supports reduction of funding in cases where schools do not show any performance progress. The main purpose of this action is to enable teachers and all stakeholders to understand the immense significance of the education system to the nation (U.S. Department of Education 1).

Additionally, the law makes it possible to have a link between students’ standards and state academic content. Furthermore, it insists that all schools should establish measuring mechanisms in order to tell the performance of students at every grade starting from the third up to the eighth (U.S. Department of Education 1).

Beyond this stage of learning, the performance of students in high schools has to be determined at least once. Another impact is that it allows access of academic information of students by their parents through issuance of report cards. These report cards clearly indicate the Adequate Yearly Performance to enable parents to understand the progress of their sons and daughters. In addition, the school is obligated to disclose the professional level of the teacher to the parent to win the confidence of parents.

Besides having set standards for schools and teachers around the country, the bill also impacts students in various ways. Unlike in cases where schools denied students opportunities to transfer to another school within the district, the No Child Left Behind bill allows bright students in schools that are unable to meet the Adequate Yearly Progress to transfer to better ones within the district (Bagley 1).

Otherwise, schools are supposed to execute performance strategies like free tutoring and increased time, especially for those students who have weak performance standards.

No Child Education Bill is one of the most praised bills that promise to transform the American education system and make it performance-oriented. By insisting on performance standards, the government acknowledges the need to link resources and performance. In other words, its funding of the public education system has to be reflected through good performance from students through the efforts of schools and teachers.

By holding schools and teachers accountable for the performance of students, the law echoes the role of a teacher that goes beyond class work teaching. However, in its continuous implementation, performance measuring parameters have to remain harmonized to promote fair gauging of students’ performance across states.

Bagley, Jennifer. “ No Child Left Behind .” Education Week . 2004. Web.

FDOE. “ No Child Left Behind Act .” Florida Department of Education, 2005. Web.

NEA. “No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB).” National Education Association , 2011. Web.

U.S. Department of Education. “ Elementary and Secondary Education Act. ” U.S. Department of Education, 2011. Web.

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IvyPanda. (2024, January 26). No child left behind. https://ivypanda.com/essays/no-child-left-behind/

"No child left behind." IvyPanda , 26 Jan. 2024, ivypanda.com/essays/no-child-left-behind/.

IvyPanda . (2024) 'No child left behind'. 26 January.

IvyPanda . 2024. "No child left behind." January 26, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/no-child-left-behind/.

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The implications of No Child Left Behind for students with developmental disabilities

Affiliation.

• 1 Department of Educational Leadership, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte, North Carolina 28223, USA. [email protected]
• PMID: 17563897
• DOI: 10.1002/mrdd.20147

In a review of current research and the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation, this paper focuses on two specific issues: (a) how students with developmental disabilities show adequate yearly progress, including a description of the assessments in which this population may participate, and (b) the policy issues surrounding NCLB including technical requirements of alternate assessments, alignment of content standards, assessments, and instruction, the requirement of all teachers to be highly qualified, and the relationship between NCLB and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA, 2004). Areas for future research are identified through a review of relevant literature.

(c) 2007 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Publication types

• Developmental Disabilities*
• Education, Special*
• Public Policy
• Social Support*
• Teaching / standards
• United States