No Child Left Behind

The NCLB Story

President Lyndon B. Johnson signed landmark public education legislation in 1965—known as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA).  This act created several federally funded public education programs in grades K-12, most notably the Title I program which was then, and is now, focused on services to economically disadvantaged children.  Since then, the original ESEA legislation has been updated—or reauthorized—every four to six years.  The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) is the most recent ESEA reincarnation. President Bush signed NCLB into law on January 8, 2002, and is itself scheduled for reauthorization in 2008.

NCLB is based on several key areas of public education.

• Accountability for Results:  States, public school districts, and the schools within those districts, are held accountable for improvement of education for all students.  The expectation is that every state will establish high standards for student achievement, and will ensure that all schools annually administer the state assessment in grades 3-11 to measure student achievement against the state standards in reading and math.  Science must be assessed starting no later than 2007.  Additionally in Florida, schools are annually held accountable in grades 4, 8 and 11 for results of the state writing assessment, and high schools must meet annual graduation rate requirements.  Reading and math assessment results are broken out by eight student subgroups, five of which are racial/ethnic groups.  The other three subgroups are economically disadvantage students, students with disabilities, and limited English proficient students. All schools are reported as to whether or not the school as a whole and the eight subgroups meet annual achievement targets to make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), while rewards and sanctions are tied to whether or not Title I schools make AYP. 

• Staff Qualifications:  All states must ensure that districts hire teachers and instructional teacher assistants working in Title I schools, who meet job qualifications as outlined in NCLB.  Additionally, all teachers in the district who were already employed by the district prior to January 8, 2002 (the day the law was signed by the president), must meet the requirements by the end of the 2005-2006 school year.  Instructional teacher assistants who were already employed in Title I schools prior to January 8, 2002 must meet the requirements by January 8, 2006.

• Parental Involvement:  All districts must ensure that Title I schools have parent involvement programs.  The district must have a school board approved district wide parent involvement policy or approved practice that encourages the involvement of families of children attending Title I schools.  Additionally, NCLB requires districts to annually notify parents of students attending Title I schools of their right to request certain information about teacher qualifications. 

• Public Reporting:  The state and school districts must annually report on the progress of students and schools within districts and within each school.  The report must include a variety of student achievement information, as well as information on teacher quality and other indicators as required by NCLB.