Abstract

During the Presidency of George W. Bush, a new law was passed that

standardized education and increased the federal roles in its success called No Child

Left Behind. For 13 years, the law was in place to keep up with each school and each

student’s success. During that time, the law was opened up to a plethora of praise and

criticism for the impact it was having on public education; for the impact it was having on

teachers; for the impact it was having on students. In this essay, I will discuss in more

detail what the No Child Left Behind law really was, how it impacted the United States’

educational system, and the pros and cons this country can see from its legislation.
 NCLB

In the early 2000’s, the United State’s educational programs were seen as no

longer being internationally competitive. In order to combat this idea and fight against it,

changed in the educational systems were made. The Bush administration took action

and signed into law No Child Left Behind, a law that is known throughout the country.

With its main purpose to improve each and every school to bring the United States’

standards back to where it was once believed to be, the No Child Left Behind law

blazed the trail a whole new format of education that will leaving a lasting impact on the

nations educational systems.

The No Child Left Behind law was first signed into legislation on January 8, 2002

by President George W. Bush. The act was seen as the updated version of the previous

act, Elementary and Secondary Education Act. Its main component was to drastically

increase the amount of say the federal government had on state education. From

grades third through eighth, students were to be tested yearly in the subjects of reading

and mathematics. Once in high school, it was only required once. These test results

were to be reported back nationally and the school’s success was measured based on

its improvements as a whole, as well as in areas of “sub-groups” such as students with

specific learning disabilities, minority groups, and low-income households. (Klein, 2018)

With this new legislation came great improvements to the educational system

that was viewed as no longer being competitive on a global level. The No Child Left

Behind law stated that all teachers had to be “highly qualified” in the subject that they

taught. It also started the shift into teaching methods taking on a more
researched-based and scientific approach. As long as the school was performing to the

standards set in place by the law, it gave each school more freedom and choice on how

they wanted to spend and utilize the federal aid and budget they were given. Most

importantly, it enforced inclusion in the classroom. It introduced the concept that

students learned best alongside their peers, so the integration of all learning abilities

proved to improve things such as testing results and even graduation rates among

students with specific learning disabilities, even increasing that rate from 57 percent in

2002 to 68 percent in 2011. (U.S. Department of Education, 2010)

While there was a fair amount of praise from the law, there was also a fair

amount of criticism surrounding it and its details. The biggest one being this new

concept of “teaching to the test”. An idea that is still very present in classrooms today,

with the new law, schools were now forced to shift the majority of their time and

resources to making sure their students passed the state standardized tests at the end

of each year. Because of this, the curriculum quickly shifted into what would produce

the best results on a test, allowing for creative and exploratory learning to fall by the

wayside. Under the legislation, schools were held accountable for not showing

improvement year after year. While this may seem like a positive, the result of this

quickly became negative. When these improvements were not happening, the

consequence often times was the firing of teachers in a school that was already

apparently struggling. Therefore in order to maintain balance and staff, when a school

was not seeing these improvements, many schools would resort to “fudging numbers”

and even cheating on the standardized tests they were to give out. The biggest criticism
can be seen as going hand-in-hand with the biggest praise. With the law forcing

inclusion in all classrooms, many opposed that this was a direct violation of the concept

that special education’s main goal is to meet each child’s own personal education

needs. And on the flipside of that, students who were tested and viewed as “gifted” were

now also not receiving the individual educational plan they needed in order to flourish

even further. (Lee, 2019)

After 13 years of this legislation, the country has now moved on. In 2015, the

Obama administration replaced the 13 year old law with a new one called the Every

Student Succeeds Act, drastically limiting the federal government’s role in the state’s

educational programs. However, the effects of the No Child Left Behind law are still in

full swing. Whether you agree or disagree with these levels of federal interference, there

is no arguing that it has left a lasting impression on the students impacted by its

legislation. It has set a standard of standardizing students and schools that may never

go away.
 Work Cited

Klein, A. (2018, October 25). No Child Left Behind Overview: Definitions, Requirements,

Criticisms, and More. Retrieved from

https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/no-child-left-behind-overview-defin

ition-summary.html​.

Lee, A. M. I. (2019, October 18). No Child Left Behind (NCLB): What You Need to

Know. Retrieved from

https://www.understood.org/en/school-learning/your-childs-rights/basics-about-chil

ds-rights/no-child-left-behind-nclb-what-you-need-to-know​.

No Child Left Behind. (n.d.). Retrieved from ​https://www2.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml​.

The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001).

(2010, December 6). Retrieved from

https://www2.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/esea02/index.html​.