Most educational professionals would agree that the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) has good points, bad points, and even a few contradictory points. After complications arose with NCLB when government officials were debating over the education portion of last year's economic stimulus package, people began to truly acknowledge that the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act wasn't going according to plan. (Read the Education Topics blog post from 27 January 2010 or follow this link to see one example).

This year, Obama's administration is going to make some necessary and (hopefully) practical changes to the somewhat infamous 2002 law, as discussed in "Administration pushes to rework No Child Left Behind law." In this article, Washington Post writer Nick Anderson briefly examines issues caused by NCLB, changes that Obama’s administration have already made, and changes that may be coming in 2010.

One of the most prominent issues with NCLB is that it punishes schools that do not produce high student scores on standardized tests. The New York Times editorial "A Vital Boost for Education" specifically says that poor and minority schools do not get "a fair share of experienced, qualified teachers." Although the No Child Left Behind Act requires states to disperse good teachers into poorer districts, that part of the law had not been effectively enforced as of last year, seven years after the law was put into place. Poor and minority schools cannot be expected to produce high scores on standardized tests without qualified teachers. Disadvantaged schools should not be punished under NCLB for lacking resources that they were supposedly granted under NCLB.

Although Obama's "Race to the Top" program has problems of its own, the "Race to the Top" program is an improvement over No Child Left Behind because it uses funds strictly as a reward for schools that meet federal standards rather than punishing schools that haven't yet received the benefits that No Child Left Behind was supposed to provide.

Obama’s administration will be hard-pressed to pick out the best measures within NCLB and expand on them while weeding out the most problematic parts of NCLB, but the “Race to the Top” program shows that they are starting to look at federal education law in a more realistic light. Using money as a positive reinforcement may encourage schools in poorer districts to strive towards meeting federal standards. So far, underprivileged schools have just been punished for being underprivileged.

After the complications with last year's economic stimulus package, people began to truly aknowledge that the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act wasn't going according to plan. (Read the Education Topics blog post from 27 January 2010, or follow this link to see one example). This year, Obama's administration is taking another look at the somewhat infamous 2002 law, as discussed in "Administration pushes to rework No Child Left Behind law." In this article, Washington Post writer Nick Anderson gives a brief overview of some of the changes that may soon go into effect as well as a brief review of some of the issues with the No Child Left Behind law.

One of the most prominent issues with this law is that it punishes schools that do not produce high student scores on standardized tests. The New York Times editorial "A Vital Boost for Education" specifically says that poor and minority schools do not get "a fair share of experienced, qualified teachers." Although the No Child Left Behind law requires states to disperse good teachers into poorer districts, that part of the law had not been effectively enforced as of last year, seven years after the law was put into place. How can poor and minority schools produce high test scores without qualified teachers? Disadvantaged schools should not be punished for lacking resources.

Although Obama's "Race to the Top" program has problems of it's own, it takes the idea that schools that do well should get rewarded from the No Child Left Behind law and leaves out the idea that schools that don't do well should be punished. The "Race to the Top" program is an improvement over No Child Left Behind because it uses funds strictly as a reward for schools that meet federal standards rather than punishing schools that haven't yet recieved the benefits that No Child Left Behind was supposed to provide.

I came across an editorial about education in the New York Times that I feel models Sudweeks' claim structure quite well. "A Vital Boost for Education" (4 February 2009) begins with a policy claim: The education stimulus package needs to be used to implement the changes of the No Child Left Behind Act. The editorial then supports that initial policy claim by using several other types of claims. A few paragraphs down, the editorial implies through factual claims that the House's bill contains the national funds necessary to supplement the state funds that schools lose to public works projects. Two value claims used in the argument imply that the House bill is better than the Senate bill because the Senate bill allows some of the stimulus laws and some parts of the No Child Left Behind Act to be ignored. Overall, the last half of this editorial is essentially a causal claim because it can be phrased in an "if-then" statement that supports the initial policy claim: If the House bill becomes law, the stimulus money will be used effectively.

In the end, neither bill won of it's own accord, but a combined bill did become law. The Observationalism website shows detailed results how the Senate voted on the Senate's initial bill and on the final combined bill.

"Mmmm! School lunch!" Yeah, right! We all remember the discolored hotdogs, the flour-flavored pizza, and the endless servings of canned green beans, canned peaches, canned spaghetti, and all the other unappetizing lunch choices available in elementary school, secondary school, and even college. However, we probably didn't think much about why these foods were so yucky. According to New York Times writer, Daniel Weintraub, a test program in California has gotten attention in Washington because the program provides food that is healthy, fresh, and worth eating! As a future teacher, I hope this program takes off and spreads to Nebraska!

Find the article at:


http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/24/us/24sfpolitics.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/20/education/20wired.html

In the article, "If Your Kids Are Awake, They're Probably Online," New York Times writer Tamar Lewin discusses a new study about how much time kids from 8 to 18 spend absorbing various forms of media. The people who conducted the study were surprised to find that average media use had actually gone up since their previous study in 2005. How could that possibly be a surprise? I've never liked to talk on the phone very much, but I was just learning to text in 2005 - now I text all the time! In high school I used to spend most of my online time using various instant messaging services and checking my email. Now that I'm not in high school any more, I can still waste an hour or two checking my email and visiting MySpace and Facebook, and let’s not forget E-bay! I also spend a lot of time visiting the web pages for the online components of my college classes. As much as my own media use has increased, I'm not at all surprised that high school students are spending more time getting cozy with various forms of media.

Hello World

This is my first official blog entry, and I'm a little bit excited about that. I haven't read many blogs yet, but I like the fact that I can write about pretty much anything. I'm interested in blogging because I think it will help me get into a regular schedule of writing instead of always staying up late to meet a deadline.