James E. Ryan, New York University Law Review, Volume 79, Number 3
June 2004
Ryan here airs a number of grievances with NCLB, "the most intrusive federal education legislation in our nation's history," including its reliance on widely varying state standards, its potential to worsen teacher shortages (by identifying the worst schools), the way it might encourage schools to rid themselves of low-performing students, and the way it confuses parents and the public. These are valid concerns, but the alarmist tone makes it tough to keep in mind that Ryan believes "the Act's goals are noble." His dominant suggestion is that the feds "get off the federalism fence" and stop trying to balance their powers with local flexibility. "Should it be determined that states cannot be trusted (to uphold rigorous standards)," he writes, "there is no good substitute for federal control of standards and tests." Of course, he rightly points out the public opposition to such a proposition, though it has merit. His other noteworthy suggestion is the use of value-added testing, which would mitigate the problem of measuring vastly different schools based on average performance rather than yearly gains. On the other hand, it is disappointing that the paper does not acknowledge that these problems might be outweighed by NCLB's benefits (which Ed Trust has begun, since this paper's publication, to document; see here). He complains much about states gaming the system to avoid NCLB sanctions, while encouraging them to do exactly that: Because "the odds are quite good that the NCLBA is another fad," he suggests "states might consider operating on the assumption that NCLBA, too, shall pass." He adds, "To the extent that the Department of Education is willing to approve [AYP] plans that suppose very large gains will occur in the last few years of the twelve-year period, states ought to use that flexibility wisely." Such suggestions (which we've railed against before: look here and here) might just fulfill Ryan's prophecy that the education world will eventually forget NCLB. In the end, readers will likely suspect that his suggestions to improve NCLB mask a desire that it be scrapped altogether. You can find it online here.
