No (Every) Child Left Behind...especially the smarties OR "How to burnout teachers faster than a Santa Ana wildfire

Yesterday as I sat in a doctor's office, waiting..... I picked up a current issue of Time magazine. Being an educator I was interested to read the cover article "Are We Failing our Geniuses?". I've BEEN knowing that the "No Child Left Behind" law is a dismal failure in terms of actually teaching children and actually preparing them for higher education. My public school teacher friends who've had to teach to the test, bemoaned the absurd focus on just one aspect of learning and how subject matter is only covered to prepare the kids to take standardized tests. You know the kind; multiple choice, fill in the bubble, no chance to put in your own words your understanding of the subject, just pencil the bubble that makes the most sense to you.

I've BEEN knowing that even though children in a classroom may not even speak English, or have not eaten breakfast, or have no one at home to help with homework cuz the PARENTS don't read English, or live in impoverished, frightening ghettos, teachers are expected to raise them up to certain standards regardless. I'm also aware (are you?) that IF said teacher cannot raise the classroom to the mandated goals that they get punished (maybe fired) and that the school itself, if overall performance does not meet expected goals, will also be penalized FINANCIALLY and have funding diminished. That is crazy, to me; a sub-standard school with sub-standard facilities, lack of textbooks, impoverished, at risk students will be punished financially and have what little funding they have diminshed in order to what.......stoke their fires to "do more with less"? (That's some pretzel logic baby! But hey, it's from BushCo....what's new...)

What I did NOT know were the following statistics about how not only is the Bush Administration's education plan failing poor kids and burning out teachers like a Santa Ana wildfire, but has totally taken a powder when it comes to the kids who may really have great potential academically. I have excerpted here some of the data which the Times article provided:

"In 2004-05, the most recent academic year for which the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) has data, U.S. universities awarded 43,354 doctorates--more than ever during the 50 years NORC has gathered the data. But the rate of increase in the number of U.S. doctorates has fallen dramatically since 1970, when it hit nearly 15% for the year; for more than a decade, the number of doctorates has grown less than 3.5% a year. The staggering late-1960s growth in Ph.D.s followed a period of increased attention on gifted kids after Sputnik. Now we're coasting.

To some extent, complacency is built into the system. American schools spend more than $8 billion a year educating the mentally retarded. Spending on the gifted isn't even tabulated in some states, but by the most generous calculation, we spend no more than $800 million on gifted programs. But it can't make sense to spend 10 times as much to try to bring low-achieving students to mere proficiency as we do to nurture those with the greatest potential.

We take for granted that those with IQs at least three standard deviations below the mean (those who score 55 or lower on IQ tests) require "special" education. But students with IQs that are at least three standard deviations above the mean (145 or higher) often have just as much trouble interacting with average kids and learning at an average pace. Shouldn't we do something special for them as well? True, these are IQs at the extremes. Of the 62 million school-age kids in the U.S., only about 62,000 have IQs above 145. (A similar number have IQs below 55.) That's a small number, but they appear in every demographic, in every community. What to do with them? Squandered potential is always unfortunate, but presumably it is these powerful young minds that, if nourished, could one day cure leukemia or stop global warming or become the next James Joyce--or at least J.K. Rowling.

In a no-child-left-behind conception of public education, lifting everyone up to a minimum level is more important than allowing students to excel to their limit. It has become more important for schools to identify deficiencies than to cultivate gifts."

So as I'm reading this, I flash on a news story I heard on ABC Radio in SF about the dearth of Math and Science teachers in the U.S. and how we are having to recruit from abroad those teachers proficient enough in these subjects as to be classified as "highly qualified". Our country simply cannot produce and attract Math and Science teachers. But other countries are churning them out like hotcakes. What's going on? We're outsourcing our teaching jobs now because we no longer have "highly qualified" candidates? Could it be linked to the abject lack of support for our gifted and talented students who perhaps would go on to achieve advanced math and science degrees? Uh......could it be that the teaching profession in the US is so grossly under-valued and underpaid that no American with the talent and degree who COULD do the job, would want to do the job? Think it's a combo pack? Me too.

I'm just wondering if the Democrats are even taking a serious look at this. I sure am not hearing a whole lot of discussion about our abysmal Education system. If YOU'VE heard any candidate talking about it or discussing a NEW plan, let me know.