[I hope this post about the changes to No Child Left Behind proposed by Congress proves interesting. It was originally posted on Edwize and written by Edwize blogger Maisie.]

Lest you think that the debate over reauthorizing No Child Left Behind is hard-to-follow/wonkish/a tempest-in-a-teapot or anything like that, note that Jonathan Kozol today entered his 76th day of a partial hunger strike over NCLB.

In protest over that law, Kozol, the widely-published, passionate advocate of educational equality, has taken himself into the realm of serious danger.

He's sick of NCLB. Mandating math and reading tests and punishing schools and students who do not meet their targets is "turning thousands of inner-city schools into Dickensian test-preparation factories," Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page quoted Kozol as saying. It has "dumbed down" school for poor, urban kids and created "a parallel curriculum that would be rejected out-of-hand" in the suburbs.

[I hope this post about the changes to No Child Left Behind proposed by Congress proves interesting. It was originally posted on Edwize and written by Edwize blogger Jackie Bennett in response to a New York Times editorial.]

Every corner of the educational community has protested the consequences of No Child Left Behind, including that the law has narrowed the curriculum and unfairly penalized schools already making progress.

In spite of that, an editorial in the NY Times defends the status quo. Referring to proposed NCLB revisions, the Times complains that the changes will "allow schools to mask failure in teaching crucial subjects like reading and math by giving them credit for student performance in other subjects."

Yet, just one paragraph earlier the Times has this to say: "Faced with poorly educated workers at home — especially in science — American companies are increasingly looking abroad."

If you, as I do, worry about the quality of public education, hang out with public school teachers or have a child in school, you’ve probably given a thought to the federal “No Child Left Behind Act” an odd, ground-breaking statute which resulted from an alliance between President Bush and Senator Kennedy. (text, regulations & USDOE guidence here .) It’s brought vast increases in standardized testing to our nation’s schools, caused vast uproar among educators, parents and other “stakeholders” (standardized test vendors, prep course crammers and textbook publishers).

It’s up for renewal and /or major modification. One of my education heroes, Jonathan Kozol, on booktour with Letters to A Young Teacher, reports he has spent time talking with Democratic Senators about proposed revisions and says he thinks the renewed statute may more properly focus educational efforts away from standardized testing as the sole benchmark of student and school success. (Kozol was on WNYC last week – hear him here .

Wednesday, August 29, 2007, Rep George Miller (D.Calif), House education chair, floated the first Congressional proposals for revision of No Child Left Behind. The Education Week story is here (free registration required, sorry),