Winter 2004

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Guest Commentary

Kirk Clark is the Executive Director of California Business for Education Excellence (CBEE), a group created by major California businesses and business organizations to restore excellence to California’s education system. CBEE serves as the business community's voice for standards, assessment and accountability in education policy decisions at the state capitol. For more information visit WWW.CBEE.ORG.

Underneath the misrepresentations that the state’s teachers association is currently floating on the airwaves across the state is a hidden agenda that seeks to undermine the significant gains and successful reforms achieved in California’s public education system.

The California Teachers’ Association (CTA) and the National Education Association (NEA) have chosen January’s marking of the second anniversary of the signing of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) to push forward an agenda aimed at undermining the Act’s unprecedented efforts to improve the nation’s public schools.

Passed by Congress and singed into law by President Bush in 2001, No Child Left Behind is a continuation of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), created in 1965 to support the education of nation’s poorest children. No Child Left Behind represents an added momentum to the longstanding efforts underway in California and around the country to raise academic standards, measure results, and hold schools and students accountable for improving achievement.

The goal of every teacher, parent, policymaker and community leader should be improving the performance of every child in every classroom in our state so they achieve a quality education and are well prepared and properly equipped to succeed in school, in the workplace and in life. While that goal resonates with overwhelming majorities of the public, CTA and NEA continue to try and undermine No Child Left Behind’s accountability measures.

No Child Left Behind calls for a closer connection between investments in education and accountability for improving student achievement. It includes annual testing to make sure every student is competent in core subjects and holds schools accountable for helping all students to be proficient in reading and math by the 2013-14 school year.  No Child Left Behind allows parents to transfer their children to higher performing schools, offers more money for local schools, ensures every child will be taught by a highly qualified teacher and focuses on teaching methods that have been proven to work.

Nowhere in the law does it say all students have the same learning ability, as the CTA and NEA would like you to believe. What the law does say is that every student matters and should have access to a quality education, and if given that access, each and every student will have the potential to learn and to succeed.

As a result of No Child Left Behind, the federal government is now spending far more money for elementary and secondary education than at any other time in history. Since President Bush took office, K-12 education funding has increased by 40 percent or $11 billion. In California alone we have experienced a 48 percent increase in Title I funds for disadvantaged students in just the past two years.

No Child Left Behind is not only providing the necessary resources, it is holding schools accountable for educating every child, regardless of gender, race, ethnic background or family income. With the unprecedented levels of federal education funding, how the money is being spent is crucial. No Child Left Behind is using taxpayer dollars more wisely and more effectively than ever before by giving state and local leaders the flexibility to target the resources where they are needed most and by focusing on programs that have proven successful.

The programs contained in No Child Left Behind are voluntary, meaning states can choose not to comply with the law and pass on the money. With billions of dollars at stake, it is in the best interest of California and other states to utilize those funds and funnel them to the students that need them most. Unfortunately, while CTA and NEA like to say more funding was promised or the law is unfunded, more than $204 million of federal Title I funds for disadvantaged students in California went unspent in fiscal years 2000-2002.

Congress and President Bush should be applauded for their vision in this bipartisan legislation and together we must accept this challenge to prepare all students equally for the 21st century and ensure every student acquires the education and skills needed to keep our nation strong and our economy growing.

While implementing the law is and will continue to be challenging, the soft bigotry of low expectations being conveyed by the CTA and NEA is no longer acceptable. It is unfair, especially to those children who have the most to gain from the law’s revolutionary reforms.