Reform of the schools law can't come soon enough.
"You'll get to the point where virtually, by definition, every school will be failing.''
U.S. Rep. JOHN KLINE, R-Minn., on No Child Left Behind
Last week a number of Minnesota schools should have been celebrating news that they had worked their way off the dreaded annual yearly progress list (AYP) under the flawed federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law. The AYP roster includes schools that have failed to meet the federal academic achievement guidelines based on test scores.When schools are on the list for several years running, they are required to take corrective action, such as offering tutoring, transfers to other schools, or firing or changing school staff.
Just a few months ago, however, some of the same schools were identified as among Minnesota's persistently lowest performers by the state Department of Education. That left some school leaders scratching their heads. If they're meeting federal goals, how could they be performing as poorly as the earlier state assessment determined?
To further muddy the issue, some schools on the state's worst-of-the-worst list are eligible for federal school improvement grants to help them turn around. Among the conditions for getting those funds, though, is firing or reshuffling school staff. But how are those actions justified if the schools are now showing signs of progress under NCLB?
The terribly mixed message provides yet another good reason to overhaul NCLB, which set an unrealistic mandate that every U.S. student be proficient in math and reading by 2014. Though the spirit of the controversial eight-year-old law is worthy, the details and implementation have left much to be desired.
Seven Minnesota schools recently got dual, contradictory designations in the same year: the High School for Performing Arts and Hmong College Prep Academy in St. Paul, and high schools in Braham, Finlayson, Greenbush, Isle and Orr.
State and federal officials say the lists are based on different data sets, but that's little comfort to the schools that are feeling jerked around. Last week the state Department of Education reported that 1,048 of the state's 2,300 schools landed on the AYP list. That's 46 percent of the state's schools -- the same number that failed to make the required progress in 2009, making it the first time since 2006 that the number didn't go up.
From one perspective, that represents improvement. Because the required test score goals have risen every year, holding steady with the number of schools means that students overall are doing better.
But state Education Department figures also show that the number of schools subject to penalties went up from 283 to 342. Within that group, the number of schools required to take the most extreme corrective action, including restructuring and possibly changing staff, doubled from 13 in 2009 to 26 this year. Nineteen of the programs facing those sanctions are in Minneapolis.
To identify the most challenged schools and help them improve -- and to stop stigmatizing good programs unnecessarily -- clearer, less punitive and more proactive federal laws are needed. National rules should, among other things, expand assessments beyond a single test and include more appropriate evaluations of English-learning and special-education students.
Congress is not expected to reauthorize education laws until next year. One of its priorities should be to avoid the paralyzing test-score confusion that has plagued NCLB in Minnesota and other states for far too long.