Under NCLB, the federal government greatly expanded its role in holding schools accountable. It did several things right—and I'll always give NCLB credit for its important contributions to education reform. It required all students be included in the accountability system—including minority students, students with disabilities, and English learners—and held schools, districts and states accountable for educating all of their students. It required states, districts and schools to report test scores disaggregated by student subgroups, exposing achievement gaps like never before. We know the achievement gap is unacceptably large—and teachers and school leaders throughout the country are working and mobilizing to address that problem. NCLB was right to create a system based on results for students, not just on inputs.
But NCLB's accountability system needs to be fixed—now. It allows—even encourages—states to lower standards. It doesn't measure growth or reward excellence. It prescribes the same interventions for schools with very different needs. It encourages a narrowing of the curriculum and focuses on test preparation. It labels too many schools with the same "failing" label regardless of their challenges. We can't sustain momentum for reform if we don't have a credible accountability system that addresses these issues.
Our proposal will make significant improvements on accountability. The biggest and most important one is that it will use student academic growth as the most important measure of whether schools, districts, and states are making progress. I'm more interested in growth than absolute test scores, as long as students are on a path to meet standards.
More tiresome rhetoric from a privatizer. "Accountability" this, "accountability" that.
When in the hell will administrators ever be held truly accountable for their actions against teachers?
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