Education

With Failing Schools, Tennessee Seeks a Waiver From No Child Left Behind

NASHVILLE, TENN. (The Blaze/AP) – Governor Bill Haslam said Tennessee is seeking a waiver to use its revamped education standards to measure schools instead of those mandated by No Child Left Behind.

With Failing Schools, Tennessee Seeks a Waiver From No Child Left Behind

Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam announced Friday that the state is seeking a waiver from all federal No Child Left Behind Requirements. (AP File Photo)

The Republican governor and state Education Commissioner Kevin Huffman told reporters in a conference call on Friday that asking for the waiver is not about making excuses for Tennessee’s schools, but that federal standards no longer serve the state’s interest of education reform.

According to results released Friday, only about 800 of Tennessee’s 1,750 or so schools made “annual yearly progress,” or AYP, under No Child Left Behind.

Tennessee is the first in the nation to ask for a total exemption to the No Child Left Behind requirements, Haslam said.

Haslam said he once preferred overhauling No Child Left Behind, “but indications out of Washington are that that doesn’t seem likely anytime soon“ and that it has ”outlived its usefulness.”

The written request, posted on the Tennessee Department of Education website, asks for a four-year exemption, or until the federal program is sufficiently changed.

According to the Tennessean, the governor and education commissioner said they don’t know if their request will be approved. U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan has warned that 82 percent of U.S. schools could be labeled failures next year if the federal regulations aren’t changed.

“If we cannot get a waiver and Congress fails to act, we will be back here in a year announcing the vast majority of schools will be failing,” Huffman said.

The Memphis Flyer reported that if waived from the No Child Left Behind standards, Huffman said Tennessee would use the federally-supported Race to the Top program as “the central reform model in the state.”

Comments (84)

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  • Erik the Viking
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 5:27pm

    They can use all the programs that can think of and it will not help. Find any school that has gone from low performing to high performing and stayed that way for 3-5 years – you can’t find any. The reason some schools do better than others is not because of the school but because of who the parents are. Parents who value education and want their kids to do well will, do well – black white rich or poor.

    Report Post »  
    • REDBLOODEDHUSKER
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 7:43pm

      Someone mentioned it earlier, and i agree. Discipline problems are getting worse and worse, which just erodes more and more time for classroom instruction. My opinion is that a lot of this can be traced back to the home situation.

      Report Post »  
    • silentwatcher
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 10:07pm

      Every child does attend school. Not every child learns at the same rate,,,some resist. The parents need to take some ownership in the child’s education should they appear to be falling behind. They need to monitor their child if they are behind and DEAL WITH IT. I won’t hold a teacher to the standards of rearing a child, just teaching….that’s why the education system now is overstepping their bounds.

      Report Post »  
    • Ronko
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 10:13pm

      No Child Left Behind is a joke and needs to be done away with.

      Report Post »  
    • PASSIONFORCHRIST
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 11:55pm

      Hey Erik the Viking: You are absolutely right! I have worked in the elem. schools for the past 16 years( and 5 years before that) and it is the parents!!!!!!!!!!! AND ALL THE OTHER BS THE GOV. WANTS TO SHOVE DOWN OURS AND OUR CHILDREN’S THROATS!!!!! TEACHERS THINK THEY OWN THE CLASSROOM, WHEN IN FACT IT IS “WE THE PEOPLE” WHO OWN THEM!!!!!!! HOME SCHOOL, HOME SCHOOL, HOME SCHOOL!!!! BELIEVE ME YOU CAN TEACH YOUR CHILDREN BETTER AND YOU DON’T NEED CONDITIONALS OR A CERTIFICATE TO TEACH!!!!!!!!!

      Report Post »  
    • Mil Mom
      Posted on July 31, 2011 at 12:58am

      The Federal and state emphasis on ever larger and larger school systems has been a BIG destructive force in childhood education. Look at the small 1 room schools for our nations past. By sixth grade, students could diagram sentences in their head, and orally perform while doing so. Students could do long division in their head, (again, school programs featured doing these things before parents and community leaders. Learning to read was the goal of each child, along with writing. The children weren’t afraid to walk to school because bullies were handled by an entire community, and teachers and parents knew each other , not always gettina along well, but bad teachers were fire-able by the community and the child who started school was not apt to feel like they were being swallowed alive by that huge building with all those kids and adults walking around in it.
      Return to small community schools, and the vast majority of families will be involved, because very few families don’t care what happens to their kids, and the vast majority WANT THEIR KIDS TO GET A GOOD EDUCATION!
      Add common sense, and the ability to follow a thought to it’s natural conclusion, and you have taught a child HOW to learn and started them on a lifetime of learning.

      Report Post » Mil Mom  
    • Ms.T
      Posted on July 31, 2011 at 7:30am

      @PassionforChrist.
      I am a Christian, Christ is my Savior. I am a teacher because that is what God called me to do. I walk into a hostile classroom every day, dealing with each student as Christ would have me to do without pushing my beliefs because it is against the law. The vast majority of teachers I have ever met profess Christ because teaching is a labor of service. The government tries to make the public think we are well paid and don’t work very much but I work from sun up to sun down, neglecting my family needs at times and live hand to mouth doing things like shopping thrift stores. I am an excellent teacher.
      As a member of We The People, I was schooled and then hired to teach. I do own that classroom as my name and my career is on the line. There is great value to teacher certification and the ongoing professional development as I was taught many things in those classes. From techniques to engage, the psychology behind why those techniques work, child development and a myriad of other things far to many to mention.
      There is a great movement toward homeschooling. But you will find home schoolers band together and assist each other in subjects. Children must be taught everything from their ABC to advanced mathematics. Not many people are capable of teaching every subject while meeting the standards expected by NCLB which much be done even in the homeschool.
      When we Christians are placed in service we are to do it with respect. Teachers do deserve respect.

      Report Post »  
    • gotta light
      Posted on July 31, 2011 at 8:22am

      A PARENT THAT TRULY, TRULY LOVES THEIR CHILD OR CHILDREN DOES NOT SENT THEM TO A PUBLIC SCHOOL!!!!!!!!

      My dog could do a better job of educating today’s youth better than any National Education Association Union member could do… As a matter of a fact I believe that the crackhead begging for change on the corner could do as good of a job as any NEA union member!! YES, THATS HOW BAD IT IS.

      These teachers don’t care about your children they only care about their pay checks, vacation & days off, and healthcare benefits.

      THE ONLY TRUE FORM OF WELFARE IS THROUGH GOVERNMENT EMPLOYMENT!!!
      WHO WILL THE PROTECT TAX PAYERS FROM SELFISH GOVERNMENT UNIONS AND INCOMPETENT POLITICIANS?!?!?!?!? WHO?!?!

      Hey bud gotta light?

      Report Post » gotta light  
    • robert
      Posted on July 31, 2011 at 7:20pm

      ML MOM:

      “Sorry Robert, I know too many, extremely intelligent black people to believe that! The problem isn‘t that the black population can’t learn at the same level, ”

      The facts say otherwise, MLMOM. For the last 100 years thousands of tests and real life experiences reveal unequivocally that blacks test lower than any other group, and they always have. Black I.Q. in the US is 85, which is lowest of all groups. Any group with an average I.Q. that low cannot grasp the necessary fundementals to compete in a first world society. (The Bell Curve, Murry and Hernnstein.)

      But, forget I.Q. for a minute. Blacks score less on all tests academically, for the most part. That’s no secret. In fact, the newspapers and media are rife with stories lamenting the achievement gap.

      To say that blacks as a group are intelligent, but they don’t have the necessary support to perform up to the norm is ignoring ALL the test data, but, more importantly, actual experience proves this out unequivocally. And it isn’t just here. They‘re behind everybody no matter what country they’re in. The African I.Q. average is 70. No group with I.Q. averages in the 70-85 range is going to be able to compete in first world nations.

      Is the reason for lack of achievement the world over just a simple matter of non-support? I think not. It isn’t poverty either since dirt poor immigrants come to this country unable to speak the language but outperform blacks by large margins.

      Report Post »  
  • Benetto
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 4:43pm

    Working in the school system…. I know first hand that NCLB is and never was going to work… Children are being left behind…. and the focus is on teaching to the test…. it is the biggest BS….

    Report Post » Benetto  
    • robert
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 5:16pm

      We don’t have a teaching problem we have a learning problem, and it involves the black population who simply cannot learn on the same level as all the other groups in the US.

      Subjecting teachers to intense turmoil, because little Willie can’t learn like the other kids involves only an inability to learn at an accepted level. It has nothing to do with teaching. It has nothing to do with diet. It has nothing to do with poverty. It has EVERYTHING to do with mental abilities.

      Until the diversity hounds recognize that and stop playing “let’s pretend everybody is equal in all ways” they’ll continue to fail as they have for the last one hundred years. And, in addition to that, little Willie will take to intimidating and causing trouble with other students on a daily basis because he’s jealous of them, because he can’t learn like they can. So, the system also helps create the vast turmoil we see in the schools every day, which spills over into the neighborhoods where beatings and flash mobs are the norm.

      What’s wrong with telling the truth?

      Report Post »  
    • flagbearer
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 6:28pm

      @Robert
      Good points and thank you for speaking the truth. NCLB was a good premise, and teachers who don‘t like it and say that they’re just teaching to the test are the very ones who resent being made to teach standards and not allowed cutsey little units. Yes, you have to teach to the tests, but you can still use higher level thinking skills. If you don’t know how, you’re in the wrong profession. And, you can’t fix stupid. We want to make college material out of non-college material, white and black. Until we get beyond the race issue, the only thing public education is doing is to bring down those who can think to the level of those who cannot–redistribution of brain power! Impossible. We need to push the capable ones ahead, be more competitive, and set even higher standards. Has anyone actually looked at the standards? Many are a bunch of BS, as this poster said. The BS is in the form of politically correct stuff and multi-culturalism. We need accountablitiy.

      Report Post »  
    • REDBLOODEDHUSKER
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 7:33pm

      @BENNETO & FLAGBEARER I’m with you. Now, not only are some of the lower learners getting lost in the shuffle, the higher ability learners are as well. Schools are forced to focus so much time on the kids that are below the standards that the really good kids that should be challenged further just have to sit there while teachers work with the lower level kids.

      Just a sad truth when dealing with such finite “standards” The only thing most schools teach to is that level, and they rarely get a chance to go beyond them with any students that are capable of doing so.

      Report Post »  
    • Consentiondum
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 10:34pm

      I can certainly agree that different people have different capacities for learning. But, if you are trying to suggest that ethnicity is an indicating factor in what those capacities are I am going to have to respectfully disagree.

      Report Post »  
    • Mil Mom
      Posted on July 31, 2011 at 1:13am

      @robert
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 5:16pm
      We don’t have a teaching problem we have a learning problem, and it involves the black population who simply cannot learn on the same level as all the other groups in the US.
      ***
      Sorry Robert, I know too many, extremely intelligent black people to believe that! The problem isn‘t that the black population can’t learn at the same level, it’s that so many black leaders, ( community organizers ) have done to much to convince them that they can’t learn the same as whites or Asians without preferential treatment.
      Preferablly children should only be grouped for group type work, and should have available to them, one on one time with a teacher or tutor. Unfortunately in the past 40 yrs, I’ve heard many teachers say, “I don’t have time for individual teaching, I have to file a lesson plan and if someone from the State School Board comes in, I’d better not be more than 5 minutes off it!”
      I agree, Home School is the best way to assure your child gets the help he/she needs, and with all the programs out their, they are usually getting a much better education!

      Report Post » Mil Mom  
  • Rosemary416
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 4:36pm

    Allowing true school choice between public and private schools would go a long way towards improving schools. If a school was not right for your child that child and their tax dollars could walk out the door and find a school that is right. Whether it be the public school down the road or the private school up the block. We need competition to improve our schools!

    Report Post »  
    • Ms.T
      Posted on July 31, 2011 at 7:55am

      I agree with you to an extent. My issue with competition between public, private and charter schools is that the best students will move away from public schools. Most of them will be white and of a better economic strata leaving an ever widening division between the educational level of the haves and the have nots.
      The better teachers will not necessarily follow because private and charter schools pay ever worse than public schools if you can imagine anyone paying worse than public schools. Private schools do not have to hire certified teachers, that means that anyone with a college degree can be in the classroom. That means that those people don’t have to meet the rigorous standards that most states and counties require their teachers to meet. Contrary to popular belief, public school teachers must meet high standards in order to obtain and retain their jobs. If these schools set a higher requirement for the people they hire then I can whole heartedly agree with your statement.

      Report Post »  
  • Prez Stephen
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 4:20pm

    The challenge in Education is the DOE and their over-reach into the classroom. The NCLB was simply a mix of good intentions and corrupt union/democrats which always leads to a short changing of students generationally. As a college president in Tennessee who reaches out to the least, lost and left behind as well as the 29 ACT students, I would love to see a better mix of charter schools, Home schooling, classical schools and good locally run schools, you will get excellent results. It is not just here in Tennessee that it isn’t working but in all the states, Tennessee is willing to speak up and say enough, why isn’t YOURS??
    If I Colleges didn’t have to mess with the DOE which WANTS to federalize all Higher Education (i.e. public schools and the Medical Field) the cost of college would drop and students would have stronger outcomes. By our going after the least, the lost and the left behind we NOT the DOE make sure they flourish – because we encourage, are tough, have expectations and honor achievement along with the high ACT students and the 30, 40, 50, 60 year old students!
    SO YES, Tennessee go for it and then continue to break the unions that care more about the union than they do the kids!! I will not hire without much vetting of a former public school teacher, otherwise you end up hiring a qualified pain! By the way please… Tennessee is a quality state – I have lived in several and the region I live in is ranked number 2 in the Nation as the place to live.

    Report Post » Prez Stephen  
    • chazman
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 4:33pm

      To He!! with the Marxist DOE! We will deal with them soon enough! Tennessee, do what you have to do!

      Report Post »  
  • Elvie
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 4:04pm

    I’ll tell you what good standards do: they keep really bad teachers on task. They give you an idea of what your student should be learning during the year. They give structure to new teachers. They allow your child to move to another school somewhere and not have to repeat the same material (and miss other important lessons). They give textbook publishers guidlines for curriculum.
    The problem is that the “reforms” that they based the new standards on often use discovery-based/ inquiry-based pedagogy which has been repeatedly shown to be ineffective. Sometimes it’s the teachers that want this garbage, but often it’s the administration that pushes it and forces the teachers to comply. Most people have no idea what’s going on, just that “it’s not working”.

    The other problem is that we expect all kids to be “better than average” (Lake Wobegone Effect). We all know that it is impossible, yet that’s what we have done to our schools–expect EVERY student (and that even includes those that are profoundly special-needs) to pass high stakes tests every year. NCLB has us unpack the test data by race and gender–which has spurred on charges of institutional racism and gender bias. And so as a result, most of the new reforms tend to favor girls and minorities (except Asian of course).

    Report Post »  
    • Prez Stephen
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 4:26pm

      Yes, I agree, the method of teaching is critical in the mix. “The problem is that the “reforms” that they based the new standards on often use discovery-based/ inquiry-based pedagogy which has been repeatedly shown to be ineffective.” It is in lower level education and in Higher Ed, at our college we have abandoned it completely and I won’t hire Teachers who use pedagogy. We are androgogy in method plus REAL application to the learning classroom to make it into a living learning lab! Good going Elvie!

      Report Post » Prez Stephen  
    • Taquoshi
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 9:51pm

      What I am seeing in our District is that we have a steady inflow of foreign student who do not speak English well and are expected to come in at grade level after a year of learning. Some of these students didn’t attend schools on a regular basis, others are learning disabled and have the language barrier and still others simply don’t want to learn. And the classroom teacher has to juggle all this along with teaching to the test?

      Now, the states are competing against each other for Race to the Top funding. Exactly what are we trying to prove here? My state’s better than your state – nanny, nanny, boo ha? Seriously??

      One very revealing movie was “Race to Nowhere”. I heard Waiting for Superman was excellent also, but wasn’t able to get to a screening.

      Report Post » Taquoshi  
  • I Love Howie Carr
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:42pm

    NCLB is just another example of Bush trying to “compromise” with leftists and then he ends up getting blamed for the entire failure. This is why we must never compromise with leftists. I‘m not against stanardized tests but if doesn’t result in the firing of failing teachers/schools, then what good is it?

    Report Post »  
  • mcellu
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:42pm

    I’m not sure why any state follows the mandates in NCLB or anything else the feds hand out. I was shocked to learn that our little school district receives less than 1% of it’s funding from the feds. And that has been a pretty steady 1% over the years. Yet they hand out mandates that have increased the costs! I just don’t get it. Would we really miss that 1%?

    Report Post »  
    • REDBLOODEDHUSKER
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 7:24pm

      Agreed. At some point, it is my hope that schools will ween themselves off the federal coffers. Then when more short sighted arbitrary rules/standards are passed down (as they always do every year), these schools can, en mass, give the Dept. of ED the middle finger…

      We need more states like Tennessee. States need to suck it up and STAND UP to the DOE and say NO MORE!

      Report Post »  
  • DiamondDog
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:38pm

    Raising standards is easy but uesless without a foundation to build on. If children were struggling under the old standards ….raising the bar will only make things worse. Discipline needs to become a centerpiece for education. It is not uncommon for a teacher to spend 6 hours per week addressing the discipline problems of one disruptive child. That adds up to 24 hours per month. That is 24 hours that could be used for classroom instruction. Parents don’t want to deal with it, principals don’t want to deal with it, and teachers are stuck in the middle with their hands tied. Yes we have bad teachers but they are not the majority.

    Report Post »  
    • TADTAD
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:43pm

      Discipline is the key. I sub teach. You would not believe the horsesh*t I have to put up with. Sailors
      (no offense to those who served in that branch, I did, too) are less vulgar.

      Report Post » TADTAD  
  • Joisey
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:33pm

    Do we let our children ask for a waiver when they don’t do well on their exams?

    How about instead of lowering standards, the state of Tennessee dissolves the public teacher unions, which are the root cause of the problem?

    Report Post » Joisey  
  • REDBLOODEDHUSKER
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:28pm

    NCLB is “past its usefulness”??? When was it EVER useful? Nice Utopian idea on paper, but horrible piece of garbage in practice. The feds could close a school down for not “improving” and the school had to pay for EVERYTHING out of their own pockets. They also don‘t get that some kids either don’t want to learn, or can’t learn to the level the fed think everyone should. Even under these terrible gov’t guidelines, eventually every school will plateau. (unless you have test changing parties like in Atlanta)

    Standardized tests are a joke and just another way to check to see if kids are learning all that gov’t sponsored progressive garbage. Close the Dept. of ED and let schools get back to teaching what is ACTUALLY important.

    Report Post »  
  • JohnFourteenSix
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:24pm

    While I love the plan to get a waiver, I think I have a better one. Eliminate the Department of Education all together! Ronald Reagan tried to make it happen, but he didn’t have a Republican majority in Congress to get it passed.
    And look how many billions we just saved by doing that……http://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/news.html#2012action

    Oh, and the return of an educated populace would be icing on the cake!

    Report Post » JohnFourteenSix  
  • Gamaliel
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:18pm

    Tennesse teachers and administrators must not cheat on the students’ test scores. Have you noticed the miraculous score improvements in your own school districts folks?

    Report Post »  
    • mcellu
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:50pm

      We have seen improvements in scores (nothing miraculous, but steady improvement most years.) But I’ve also seen the lengths we have to go to to make those improvements. More classroom time spent learning to test. Teachers aids pulling kids out of social studies b/c they need to work on their reading or math. Time and space for kids who need the extra time or who missed a day of testing. Parent volunteers bringing in snacks during test weeks. No homework and extra recess during testing (Can you see why my youngest LOVES testing weeks?!) And then you add in the cost of the test, distributing the test, correcting tests and determining scores. What a complete waste of time and money.

      Report Post »  
    • REDBLOODEDHUSKER
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 7:52pm

      I live in a rural community and the grade school enrollment is not very high in some grades (for example we 6 students in 3rd grade) So if one year the school reports having 95% of 20 5th graders meet the required standard, we’re all smiles. But then the next year the class is only 10 and one kid fails. Uh oh, now we have to report to only 90% met the standard. Then the group of 6 takes it and again just one fails. Yikes! Now only 83% met the standard!

      The DOE will then brand the school “in need of improvement”. The school then have to go through all the hoops to show the fed that they have a plan to “improve”. All because just 2 kids failed a standardized test. Ridiculous.

      Report Post »  
  • trooper
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:01pm

    Enough with the PC BS, we all know why they want a waver. First of all I would like to make it clear that the only people who learn are the ones that want too, white kids most of all. It‘s the black kids that don’t want to learn and even if they could make something of them selves they refuse to put any effort into it. The reason being is that our governement gives them a pass and they still complain obout YT “keeping them down”.

    Report Post »  
  • rdk
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:00pm

    Did “no child left behind” do anything other that increase bureaucracies and add pay to the administrators?

    Report Post »  
  • LA MIGRA
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:58pm

    I‘m a teacher in southern California at a school 20 miles from the border and I’m also an elected school board member at our local elementary school. Poor performance in schools is a result of different factors. A lot of our problems started when state and federal departments of education started mandating school standards (NCLB etc.) instead of letting local districts teach how and what they feel is best. All school funding is tied to state requirements. For example if a school needs new text books they have to purchase texts from a state approved list of texts and you end with things like “Heather Has Two Mommies” etc. Another issue in the southwest and other areas is illegal immigration. The students in our school districts down here on the border who cause schools not to meet state mandated standards are primarily children of illegal immigrants who don’t speak English. Schools end up having to hire more teachers to teach English to these kids and other electives get cut. The teacher’s union is diabolical and protects bad teachers. In order to get hired at most schools in California you have to join the union. The union then takes about $1,100 in dues out of each teacher’s paycheck and gives much of it to liberal political candidates. There are a lot of good teachers fighting the good fight such as myself and many of my colleagues, however it gets very frustrating. My brother who is also a teacher finally got fed up with it and moved to Virginia. God help us.

    Report Post » LA MIGRA  
    • lindathepatriot
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 8:11pm

      I couldn’t agree with you more. I teach in Southern California and I am sick of our union and our district.

      Report Post »  
  • WCCMDT
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:54pm

    Government + Unions = FAILURE

    Report Post »  
  • louise
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:43pm

    I say BRAVO, TN!!!
    Put Education back into the hands of the communities

    Report Post » louise  
    • ME
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 3:19pm

      I would and will be for that when its not in the hands of the Unions!!! With Union swine at the troff there needs to be some standards or it is all one sided and we have already seen how that works. Great for teachers that will never be fired or responsible for out come. Out come is the only way to punish Unions teachers that are useless and exempt from any accountability by contract.

      When there is no national unions we will need no national oversight. We just need to outlaw Unions in any public sector and this country would be much better.

      Report Post » ME  
  • Son_of_Liberty
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:19pm

    Lets get the government out of education, out of religion, out of health care, and out of our lives in general. The only thing that comes from government is tyranny.

    Report Post » Son_of_Liberty  
    • saranda
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 7:01pm

      You forgot to add “out of our bedrooms”.

      Report Post »  
  • ladyda
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:13pm

    It is a bad bill. Congress should be required to abolish 2 old bills for every new one that is written. There must be trillions of them, (Obama care being number 1)…hey, maybe this extra time would slow them down from writing so darn many!

    Report Post » ladyda  
  • chips1
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:11pm

    Yo be dissing da scoos in da hood. Wat yo meen “Fun With Dick and Jane” stuuf? Whatt yo be putin down?

    Report Post »  
    • dwh320
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:21pm

      What a load of garbage. It’s not NCLB or the kids not wanting to learn.. IT’S THE TEACHERS UNION that has failed the kids. The Teachers only care about their pocket and the hell with the kids. The union has entrenched itself to the point the bad teachers can not be removed. The state is left with the education boat full or mostly full of incompetent self serving political driven teachers. KICK OUT THE UNIONS AND FIRE THE BAD TEACHERS. All NCLB has done is EXPOSE the deep destruction the unions have caused our education system.

      Report Post » dwh320  
  • teddrunk
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:11pm

    It’s Tennessee. You mean the cypherin‘ an spelun an da reedun isn’t too good? Did ja reely x pecked more?

    Report Post »  
  • fertlmind
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:10pm

    no child left behind is simply a progressive attempt to indoctrinate the youth of Anerica to believe that their liberty is only achieved through big government and to entrench class warefare in our society so the socialist and communiest can eliminate the free market democracies.

    Every state should ban it….

    Report Post » fertlmind  
    • loriann12
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:13pm

      Here in Texas, they teach to the test. When it comes time for the TAKS Test, they only teach what’s on the test for a few weeks, then resume their regularly scheduled stuff.

      Report Post »  
    • GiGi80
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 5:32pm

      NCLB was an initiative of the George W. Bush administration. How is that progressive or liberal?

      I would think that you public-school-teacher bashers would love it, as it ties student “achievement” on standardized tests to teacher performance.

      Report Post »  
    • ropati
      Posted on July 30, 2011 at 10:38pm

      @GIGI80. Yes, NCLB was instituted under the Bush administration, but the bill was written by Teddy Kennedy. There’s one big slip for humanity.

      Report Post »  
  • Captain Crunch
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:09pm

    Just tell the federal government to get lost, refuse compliance with their standards, and then do it your way. Children can be well educated without being a slave to the feds or their money.

    Report Post »  
  • banjarmon
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:09pm

    Education is a LOCAL issue, NOT a federal issue…

    Report Post » banjarmon  
  • The_Plumber_Says
    Posted on July 30, 2011 at 2:07pm

    No Mexican left behind…………

    Report Post » The_Plumber_Says  
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