Report: No Child Left Behind should be left behind

A bipartisan panel of lawmakers conducting a yearlong study on the effectiveness of Bush's "No Child Left Behind" has pronounced it a flawed, convoluted, and unconstitutional program that has usurped state and local control of public schools.

The report also said the law's accountability system, which punishes schools whose students fail to improve steadily on standardized tests, undermines school improvement efforts already under way in many states and relies on the wrong indicators. In addition, the law's rules for educating disabled students conflict with another federal law, and it creates bureaucratic requirements that fail to recognize the educational challenges faced by teachers in the nation's 15,000 school districts.

The Bush administration's response was predictable. Assistant Secretary of Education Ray Simon refuted the report's findings, saying, "No Child Left Behind is bringing new hope and new opportunity to families throughout America, and we will not reverse course."

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/24/education/24child.html