Education Secretary Rod Paige announced this week that the Department of Education will relax NCLB's "highly qualified teacher" requirements. Critics contend that the move is a "tactical retreat" designed to quell criticism of the law, which has been growing stronger as state lawmakers across the political spectrum threaten to eschew Title 1 dollars to avoid having to comply with NCLB's mandates. Paige insists, however, that the new policies are simply an attempt to "offer common-sense solutions that will help states and districts get the best teachers in front of the most needy students as soon as possible." The changes include: offering teachers in rural areas who are highly qualified in one subject three additional years to become highly qualified in additional subjects they teach; giving newly hired teachers three years to demonstrate qualification; and allowing states to use their own certification standards to determine competence for teachers who cover more than one field. While many groups - notably the NEA - have welcomed the changes as evidence that "the debate is no longer on whether NCLB and its implementation is flawed and needs to be fixed, but on what needs to be fixed," Ross Weiner of the Education Trust predicts that allowing such "flexibility" will give states "an invitation to define their problems away, instead of a call to tackle them head-on." These rules, he says, "extend a pattern of disowning and diminishing the teacher quality provisions in the law, and postpones the day when public education will realize its goal of equal opportunity for all."
"Softening of 'No Child Left Behind,'" by Gail Russell Chaddock, Christian Science Monitor, March 16, 2004
"Rules eased on upgrading U.S. schools," by Diana Jean Schemo, New York Times, March 16, 2004 (registration required)