Bipartisan Commission to Offer Recommendations on No Child Left Behind Act
Feature Story by civilrights.org staff - 2/15/2006
A new bipartisan Commission on No Child Left Behind will conduct a "high level, independent, and bipartisan analysis" of the education reform law over the next 12-18 months, Commission co-chairs Secretary Tommy G. Thompson and Governor Roy E. Barnes announced February 14.The Commission will offer recommendations to Congress and the Bush administration for reauthorization of NCLB, which is scheduled to begin in 2007.
The Commission will be made up of 11 to 15 members from a variety of backgrounds, including academia, civil rights, business, and education. Alex Nock, the Commission's director, said that the Commission's membership is still being finalized. Funded by private foundations, the Commission will be housed at the Aspen Institute.
Public input on NCLB will be gathered through hearings and a Commission web site, www.nclbcommission.org. Commission staff said that the hearings and a series of white papers the Commission will issue will focus on "key" NCLB topics, such as teachers, assessments, accountability, sanctions, and incentives.
William L. Taylor, Chair of the Citizens' Commission on Civil Rights, called the establishment of a bipartisan NCLB Commission "a most welcome development."
"The law, first enacted under President Clinton and then under President Bush, is the work of Democrats and Republicans dedicated to improving educational opportunity for disadvantaged children. The Commission can help strengthen educational reform by providing information on what is going right and what needs to be fixed," Taylor said.
Taylor is co-counsel for the Connecticut NAACP and minority school children, who have sought to join a case brought by the state of Connecticut contesting the Act.
The Commission co-chairs, through their public announcements, acknowledged that there has been public concern about the Act's implementation and emphasized that the Commission will analyze the law's strengths and weaknesses.
A study released on February 14 by the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University contends that the law is being changed and undercut through a series of compromises negotiated between the U.S. Department of Education and individual states.
The report, entitled "The Unraveling of No Child Left Behind: How Negotiated Changes Transform the Law," analyzes the changes states have made to their accountability plans through such negotiations and examines who benefits (and loses) from the changes.
