According to a NYTimes piece, the Bush administration’s No Child Left Behind law requires that “every American child reach proficiency in reading and math.” I don’t know much about the law so I don’t know how proficiency gets defined or even whether the law actually requires such. But the Obama administration thinks the requirement is utopian. That sounds about right. And now they’re going to do something about it and replace it with a new requirement. What’s the new requirement? According to the same NYTimes piece: “that all students should graduate from high school prepared for college and a career.”
Perhaps there is something to be seen about what each side cares about in the contrast between reading and math on one hand and college and career on the other, but … feel free to explain to me how this new requirement is any less utopian.
Sydney
Alan Schmierer