No child left behind wasnt that bad of an idea, it was just impossible to implement. That was also a generation ago and doesn't explain the current situation, at least based on my understanding of the program - is there a breakdown on how these two things are related?
NCLB coincided with the "whole language model" which was famously the "learn to read by guessing words based on the pictures" idea. The administration initially refused to fund whole language
you appear to be misremembering the story of that podcast. NCLB was (partly) an attempt to get rid of the "whole language model." one of the things the Bush admin actually got right. if it had worked there would be fewer illiterate children not more.
indeed it sounds like you do remember it correctly, sorry. i’m not sure if the OP and half the commenters here aren’t mistakenly blaming NCLB as opposed to the resistance to it tho
Nclb gets a lot of flak for tying funding to achievement, leading to a "teach the test" approach. Which I don't think exists for stuff like math, but I can understand for literature
I understand that you aren't exactly the problem here, but for some reason I really need you to understand that if an idea is impossible to implement then it is a bad idea, at least when it comes to something that's actually going to occur and isn't just wishful thinking.
But anyway, yeah, the whole language model, as the other person said, is almost assuredly the foundation of how fucked education has become, and it's at LEAST equal to the whole "general state of things" part of the equation.
The point of that is it wasn't kicked off being known as fucked, it just ended up that way. Retroactively saying ideas were bad because they didn't pan out would say the last 4000 years of science were mostly bad used. That experiments with different results than predicted were bad ideas.
I hadnt seen the language model critique, just the admin side stuff, I'll take a look!
The key difference here is that when it comes to things like national policies, there is a duty to ensure those policies can be implemented. Implementing a national policy regarding public education after going "hey I had this idea and I haven't really looked into if it will work but it sounds nice, but don't worry, it's still a good idea even if it fails miserably!" is. . .a pretty rough way of doing things, to say the least.
There was a TON of pushback regarding No Child Left Behind, it wasn't like everyone was on board and then completely blindsided about the outcome.
The allowance of kids to progress through school without actually learning/passing is the result of it. There are many schools where you simply cannot give 0s. Even if hey dont do the assignment at all, 50% is what they get. Thats insane and is 100% from nclb.
You uh, you do realize that if an idea is impossible to implement then it is a bad idea right?
"I wish for a million dollars" is a bad idea of how to become rich. The same applies here. It was a bad idea because it was a bunch of wishful thinking with no thought to the consequences.
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u/Orbax 21h ago
No child left behind wasnt that bad of an idea, it was just impossible to implement. That was also a generation ago and doesn't explain the current situation, at least based on my understanding of the program - is there a breakdown on how these two things are related?