The battle cry has been the same for the past two years, but president George W. Bush has yet to properly arm our nation’s schools for his No Child Left Behind Act.
The act was signed into law on Jan. 8, 2002. Its purpose was to improve the country’s K-12 education by raising general educational standards for students, teachers and schools as well as to reinforce those standards through standardized testing.
However, the superior results educators were expecting, have not surfaced because of funding. Since the adoption of the act, between $26 billion and $34 billion has been authorized by Congress yearly for educational spending, but President Bush has only opted to spend $22 billion to develop necessary educational resources, like text material and multimedia.
In essence, the act has established a federal grading system for all K-12 schools in the United States based on composite scores detailing the performance of teachers and a variety of subgroups of students.
While President Bush’s annual budget has increased over the past two years, he has failed to request the appropriate amount of spending to ensure the success of the program.
In result, the teachers have been short-changed and left ill-equipped to take on the proposed two-year challenge
Bush can discuss how important a strong education is to the defense of our nation, but will not provide a stronger defense for education where it really counts – the budget.
He has jumped to defend the rest of the world, but can’t seem to stay focused on the needs of the people at home.
It is a shame to see so many children being cheated out of the opportunity to receive a high-class education. With the way things stand, every child is being left behind.
Karen E. Marsh for The Editorial Board