CEP: 48% Of Schools Failing Under NCLB Despite Duncan's Higher Estimate

Coverage of the Center on Education Policy report on the number of US schools which failed to make AYP in 2011 mushroomed today, with much of the content-most of which was negative in tone-drawing attention to the disparity between the 48% failure rate found in the study and Education Secretary Arne Duncan's predictions earlier this year that that figure could have been as high as 82%.

Bloomberg News (12/16, Hechinger) reports that the report indicated that "almost half" of US schools "are labeled failing under" NCLB, "compared with the 80 percent estimate President Barack Obama's administration cited as a rationale for changing its mandates." The article notes that Obama and Duncan "cited the 80 percent figure this year in justifying a plan to offer waivers to the law for states that agree to abide by the administration's education agenda, including tying teacher evaluations to student performance." However, "the lower estimate still shows the need for change, said Jack Jennings, the center's president. 'Whether it's 50 percent or 80 percent, the law is too crude a measure of what is considered failing,' Jennings said in a phone interview. 'The law is defective, and Duncan is right to want to change it.'"

 

Politico (12/16, Lee) adds, "Forty-eight percent of public schools nationwide didn't make adequate progress under the standards – up from the 39 percent in 2010 and the highest failure rate since No Child Left Behind took effect in 2002, the Center on Education Policy report said." 35 states saw a 6-year high in their failure rates, Politico reports, while some 24 states and DC saw over half of their schools fail to make AYP. Meanwhile, "in five states – Florida, Missouri, New Mexico, Massachusetts and South Carolina and D.C. - more than 75 percent of schools failed to achieve an adequate level of annual progress."

 

In its coverage, the Washington Times (12/16, Wolfgang) reports that schools in DC "ranked near the bottom, with 87 percent failing to clear the bar, the report says. Only Missouri was worse, with 88 percent of its schools falling short. Wisconsin schools performed the best, with 11 percent missing the mark. In Maryland and Virginia, 45 percent and 62 percent, respectively, didn't make adequate yearly progress."