At this point, the evidence looks like No Child Left Behind is failing to deliver.
Reading scores among fourth- and eighth-graders showed little improvement over the past two years, and math gains were slower than in previous years, according to a study released yesterday. The disappointing results came despite a new educational testing law championed by the Bush administration as a way to improve the nation’s schools.
Most troubling for educators are the sluggish reading skills among middle-school students, which have remained virtually unchanged for 15 years, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, which administers the federal test and bills itself as the “nation’s report card.”
Though the tests have been taken by fourth- and eighth-grade students about every two years since 1990, the latest NAEP scores were the first tangible testing numbers available since the implementation of No Child Left Behind — the Bush administration’s premier and controversial education initiative requiring all states to test students annually as a prerequisite for receiving federal funds.
“No one can be satisfied with these results,” said Ross Wiener, policy director for the Education Trust, an advocacy organization that backed No Child.
It sounds pretty discouraging. Unless you’re the president (via Froomkin).
“Secretary Spellings has just delivered what’s called the Nation’s Report Card, which is a sample of over 300,000 students from — in every state, as to whether or not they’ve got the capacity to read and write and add and subtract in the fourth and eighth grade.
“This is an encouraging report…. No Child Left Behind is working.”
Some people get a lemon and they make lemonade. Bush gets a lemon and he makes up his own version of reality.
It’s kind of impressive, when you think about it. Told Raphael Palmeiro tested positive for steroids, Bush says he doesn’t believe the tests. Told scientists reject intelligent-design creationism as pseudo-science, Bush says he doesn’t believe the scientists. Told there were no WMDs in Iraq, Bush says there were. Told about the overwhelming evidence pointing to global warming, Bush says it’s inconclusive.
I wonder what the weather is like in Bush’s bubble…