Among the reform proposals President Obama plans to implement to the Bush Administration's landmark "No Child Left Behind" will be changes to the way school districts receive federal funds. Under the proposal, announced today, distribution of funding will be based on student achievement and academic progress, rather than enrollment.
The proposal would also eliminate the controversial 2014 deadline for academic proficiency. Any changes to the law would have to be approved by Congress.
From the New York Times:
Significantly, said those who have been briefed, the White House wants to change federal financing formulas so that a portion of the money is awarded based on academic progress, rather than by formulas that apportion money to districts according to their numbers of students, especially poor students. The well-worn formulas for distributing tens of billions of dollars in federal aid have, for decades, been a mainstay of the annual budgeting process in the nation's 14,000 school districts.
Currently the education law requires the nation's 98,000 public schools to make "adequate yearly progress" as measured by student test scores. Schools that miss their targets in reading and math must offer students the opportunity to transfer to other schools and free after-school tutoring. Schools that repeatedly miss targets face harsher sanctions, which can include staff dismissals and closings. All students are required to be proficient by 2014.Educators have complained loudly in the eight years since the law was signed that it was branding tens of thousands of schools as failing but not forcing them to change.
The education law has been praised for focusing attention on achievement gaps, but it has also generated tremendous opposition, especially from educators, who contend that it sets impossible goals for students and schools and humiliates students and educators when they fall short. The law has, to date, labeled some 30,000 schools as "in need of improvement," a euphemism for failing, but states and districts have done little to change them.
The last serious attempt to rewrite the law was in 2007. That effort collapsed, partly because teachers' unions and other educator groups opposed an effort to incorporate merit pay provisions into a rewritten law. Earlier this month, Mr. Duncan and more than a dozen other administration officials took steps toward organizing a new rewrite, meeting with the Democratic chairmen and ranking Republican members of the education committees in both houses of Congress.
The Obama Administration will also seek to add $3 billion in additional for funding the nation's public schools. Once the law is reauthorized, an additional $1 billion would be added. More money would also be given to charter schools.
From Reuters:
(Obama) would also expand the stimulus initiative known as "Race to the Top" that funded new education innovations, especially at semi-autonomous charter schools, and has added $490 million in his budget for the charter school system. He would also create a $500 million testing program to gauge the success of various innovations.
In the budget, Obama also proposes giving $950 million of competitive grants to states and school districts for recruiting teachers and principals, as well as train them, and $210 million to "Promise Neighborhoods," to strengthen community services for students.
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