Indiana’s educators can now understand the relief that students feel when a tough assignment is waived.
The state has been granted a waiver from some parts of the tough No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). Last week, Indiana became one of 10 states to successfully apply for a waiver from President Barack Obama and the U.S. Department of Education.
An excited Dr. Tony Bennett, Indiana’s superintendent of public instruction, expressed appreciation for the waiver.
“Indiana’s commitment to comprehensive reform has enabled us to be among the first states to receive a waiver,” Bennett said. “This is a tribute to the hard work of so many educators, students, parents, community members and policy makers in our state.”
Signed into law by President George W. Bush in 2002, NCLB created high federal standards and measurable goals designed to spark education reform, increase K-12 student achievement and maintain accountability for educators. A major emphasis was placed on raising standardized testing scores.
Now a decade old, NCLB is being criticized by some observers as outdated and burdensome to local school systems with their own successful teaching methods.
During a press conference with education officials from various states, Obama noted that NCLB is five years overdue for an update, and said his administration took action to grant the waivers because it has taken Congress too long to reform the act.
The president said states that have submitted realistic plans to set higher, honest standards on their own terms received the waivers.
“We’ve said we want high standards, and we’ll give you flexibility in return,” Obama said. “We will combine greater freedom with greater accountability, because what might work in one state may not work in another.”
Obama added that NCLB’s original goals are still praiseworthy, especially increasing accountability and closing the achievement gap for minority students.
“But we’ve got to do it in a way that doesn’t force teachers to teach to the test, or encourage schools to lower standards in order to avoid being labeled as failures,” he said.
In Indiana, educators are expressing cautious optimism over the possible opportunities presented by the waiver.
Nate Schnellenberger, president of the Indiana State Teachers Association (ISTA), said he hopes Bennett and the Indiana Department of Education (IDOE) use the waiver to establish reforms that are actually shaped by concerned parties from across the state.
“It’s important that the IDOE be committed to the spirit of this waiver to bring about real school reform with actual input from teachers, parents and other public stakeholders,” said Schnellenberger, who attended Obama’s waiver announcement. “We’re talking about access to early education, well-rounded instruction, safe and supportive learning environments and access to caring and qualified teachers.”
Stephanie Sample, IDOE’s spokeswoman, said NCLB has both strengths and flaws.
“It enforced accountability on states and schools where previously there had been none,” she said. “The intent behind it was really good, but the problem is that as states such as Indiana became more advanced in measuring things like student growth, NCLB didn’t keep pace with that. It didn’t grow with us.”
Dr. Eugene White, superintendent of Indianapolis Public Schools (IPS), the state’s largest school district, agrees that NCLB has left a mixed legacy, saying some things about it “were great, others unfair.”
On the one hand, reaching for federal standards has helped lead to an increase in the IPS graduation rate, which jumped from 46.1 percent in 2007 to 64.6 percent last year. At the same time, the dropout rate has fallen from 46 percent in 2007 to 22 percent last year.
“It’s an incredible achievement. We’ve cut our dropout rate in half in four years,” White said. “Our teachers and principals are doing (a lot of) work to keep students in school in order to help them complete their educations.”
White noted that in addition to standards, various decisions by the district have also been helpful such as incorporating new programs for students who fall behind and the creation of innovative community high schools.
On the other hand, White added, the problem with NCLB faced by urban districts like IPS involves meeting Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) with subgroups, such as those in special education or English as a Second Language (ESL) programs. White believes it is important for schools to have subgroups because they help educators keep track of the progress of all students.
“However, if you were a school district with a high number of subgroups, your chances of making AYP were substantially less than school districts that didn’t have those subgroups,” White said. “It was unfair. For example, for an ESL student to come over here and take a test in year two, and if they failed to pass it their whole school was penalized, although the school was actually trying to educate the kid. All of those subgroups would have to meet AYP, or we wouldn’t meet federal standards.”
White would like to know which requirements of NCLB are being waived. He would have to see more details before determining whether or not the waiver is helpful to IPS.
“The only thing I know we’re being waived from is AYP, but there are a lot of other issues concerning supplemental education programs and other things that we need to know about,” White said.
Sample said the state is waiting to receive complete information about the waiver from federal officials. What is known is that the waiver will remove cumbersome data requirements about teacher certification, and more importantly, eliminate the confusing “dual system” schools have had to follow for 10 years.
“Schools were held accountable to both the federal AYP metric and the state’s letter metric requirements,” Sample said. “With the waiver, we can merge both.”
Sample confirmed that schools will no longer have to follow AYP.
“That’s cool for schools because under AYP, it didn’t matter how well a school did under the state system, if they didn’t make AYP under the federal system, we couldn’t give them anything higher than a C,” she said.
Sample said some elements of the waiver will take effect immediately, while others will be granted a little later.
“We’re expecting more details and specifics from the federal Department of Education soon,” she said.