No child held behind
I've been reading through the "No child left behind" act, and no matter how I read it, I seem to get the same impression. This act requires all schools to maintain a specific level of competency, and all students to achieve the same level of competency. They have a nice little euphamism on the website "Closing the achievement gap". It seems to me that whenever you make all people the same, you expend a huge amount of effort to make the low end conform to the middle, while treating the high end like an annoyance at best.

When a school is told that all children must meet the minimum level of acheivement, where do you think that school's effort will be? Advanced classes for accellerated learning? Arts and Music? Field trips? No. There will be remedial classes for everyone, where teachers teach only the test so they can get their money.

Listen, if you were a farmer, and you had a field of wheat doing really well, and another field doing really poorly, which one will you spend your time, care, and attention on? Especially if you are paid by the amount of passably wholesome wheat you can grow? What a shame children aren't like wheat. If we could think of children as commodities, harvested, bound and sold, this whole plan would work. As long as we don't think of them as people, we're cool.

When I was a kid, I got to fifth grade before the teachers recognized that I had a learning disability (It's called Dyscalculia) but at the time, they didn't have a name for it. The name I was told was "Bad at Math". So, I was the only fifth grader who didn't go to fifth grade math. I loved Math, I truly believe it is the language of God. I love finding out how formulae work, how they can be applied, how they can be proven. I was considered an oddity, because I could work through a proof all day, but I couldn't do long division.

They placed me in a remedial class with kids who ate paste. I remember one time, when the teacher asked us (all sitting at the tiny, clown colored, plastic table one foot tall) if we could think of any other words which meant "Two". The other kids stared at her, but one of the nice things about Dyscalculia is that I rock at English skills. I immediately came up with "Pair, twin, couple, set, does 'half' count?" I frowned at her as she stuck a little gold star on my shirt.

So that was my lot in life. My parents, teachers, other students just accepted that while I was very bright and clever, I could not do quick math to save my life. I was writing a text adventure on my TI-994A one day, when my mother said, "You know, it's nice that you like computers, but you can't be an engineer without good math skills." The implied ultimatum pissed me off to no end. My mother meant well, she was trying to get me to center my attention on something I had a better chance succeeding at. But that ultimatum upset me enough to push me into engineering. I fought for every C I got in Math, but I did get them. I was in remedial Math all through High School, I had to take every College Math class twice, but I did beat it. I got my degree, and I've been programming video games for the last seven years.

My point is that I made this happen. My parents were supportive, but they didn't push me. They accepted it as a learning disability (I think they had higher hopes for my brother, he was the brilliant one). My schools sure as hell didn't push me. They just kept assigning me to classes where I would feel like I was "among my peers". If I hadn't pushed myself, I would not be where I am now.

Based on this new No Child Left Behind act, I would not have been pushed to excel. I would have been pushed to change schools. I think my school would have found it cheaper to give up the money of a child with low Math scores than it would be to teach a 'disabled' child.

It reduces a child to an asset. If a child excells in one area, and flounders in another, they will not be encouraged in the area of their excellence, they will have their failures pounded into them. If you want to see a problem child, take an artist, and only talk to him about Math.

Apparently, according to the No Child Left Behind act, schools that aren't performing well enough will have to provide supplemental care (like tutoring and after-school assistance). So, if a school can't afford to pay it's good teachers well enough to keep them, they will then be expected to pull extra money out of their magical money tree to pay for tutoring and after-school assistance.

Of course, they won't get more money to pay for those sessions, because now students will be able to take their stake in the school, and go to a better school. So, the better schools will flourish, while the worse schools wilt on the vine. No child left behind? How many schools will be left behind?

If I'm wrong about this, please tell me. I just can't see a good side to it.
- posted by BrandG @ 11:30 PM