[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 52 (Wednesday, April 21, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4234-S4236]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              NEGATIVE IMPACT OF NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND ACT

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, the reason I came to the floor is, first, to 
express my appreciation to the former chairman, now the ranking member, 
of the Education Committee, the senior Senator from Massachusetts, for 
constantly reminding us of the importance of education, enabling 
America's families to improve the quality of their life.
  I want to talk about the negative impact of the No Child Left Behind 
Act.
  Congress is not expected to pass much legislation this year, even 
though there is much more that should be done. Of the dozens of issues 
we have yet to consider, addressing the consequences of the No Child 
Left Behind Act is paramount.
  When the No Child Left Behind Act was passed, there were many who 
lauded President Bush's commitment to education. After all, who among 
us would allow any child to slip through the cracks of our educational 
system if it could be prevented? None of us would do that. At the time, 
many thought this was sweeping legislation and that sweeping 
legislation would fill those gaps.
  Sadly, this has not been the case. The No Child Left Behind Act has 
done more harm than good in more States than not. In the State of 
Nevada, we are suffering under the burden of unfunded mandates this law 
imposed. In fact, a leading headline in the Reno newspaper, the second 
largest newspaper in the State of Nevada, reads:

       Educators Give No Child Left Behind Act a Failing Grade.

  The man who stated that is the superintendent of public instruction 
of Washington County, the second largest school district in the State 
of Nevada. He said it is not working. It took a lot of courage for this 
man to do this. He comes from a county that is a Republican county by 
registration, but it is a county that is very fair and very 
independent. I am sure they recognize that Jim Hager, the fine man that 
he is, the long-time superintendent he has been, would not say anything 
unless he truly believed it was true:

       Educators Give No Child Left Behind Act a Failing Grade.

  When I talk about Jim Hager, I am talking about the Washington County 
School District superintendent, but he is also president of the Nevada 
Association of School Superintendents. We have 17 counties in Nevada, 
17 school superintendents, and he is speaking for them. He is speaking 
for the Nevada Association of School Superintendents.
  Let me give a snapshot of the education landscape in Nevada. We have 
17 counties, as I have mentioned, in the State of Nevada. Clark County, 
of course, is the county Las Vegas is in. Well over 70 percent of the 
people of the State of Nevada live in Clark County. It is a big county. 
The State of Nevada has approximately 400,000 students. About 280,000 
students are from Clark County. It is the fifth or sixth largest school 
district in America.
  I also want to say here, for future understanding of my remarks, in 
the Clark County School District, about 30 percent of the children in 
that school district are Hispanic. The vast majority of those Hispanic 
students come from Mexico. Many of those children, even though they are 
as smart as any other kids in America, have language problems because 
some of their parents do not speak English.
  Clark County, which has this huge school district, needs $1 million 
annually for recruitment efforts. They have to hire 2,000 new teachers 
a year.
  We have a real problem graduating minority students. We are 49th in 
the Nation. We graduate overall about 63 percent of all students. That 
is not good. We recognize that. But you will not meet a single parent, 
teacher, principal, superintendent, or school administrator of any kind 
who is not concerned about preserving and improving the quality of 
education for the kids in Nevada. In fact, there is no one within the 
sound of my voice who is not committed to giving every child an 
opportunity to graduate and go on to higher education, whether that 
higher education is college or some kind of trade school.
  Whatever it takes for us to get there, we are going to do that. In 
fact, Nevada did create its own accountability system that will work in 
our States. It addresses the needs of our children in our own way. The 
No Child Left Behind Act was passed and now we are living in its wake. 
It reminds me of when I went to Hawaii for the first time. There was 
this beautiful beach on the island of Maui. We were eating in a 
restaurant and it was such a beautiful view. We had a conversation with 
the waitress and she told us when she was a little girl the beach that 
we could see opened up and went out for a football field, way out into 
the ocean. The kids ran out there. There was a school nearby where the 
restaurant is now. They ran out there. What they did not realize is 
that was a tsunami and it pulled the water out and you could not see 
the waves coming in. It washed over everybody and killed a lot of kids 
and a lot of people were hurt.
  That is what has happened with the No Child Left Behind Act. One 
cannot see on the surface what has happened, but the undertow, the 
tsunami, has wiped out a lot of children. It is ironic that this 
sweeping education reform legislation authored by President Bush is 
receiving a failing grade from every school system it was intended to 
help. There is no question about it, as I indicated before, that it is 
hurting kids in Nevada. It is so bad in Utah, they have withdrawn from 
the program. The State of Utah--I am sure it is the first of a number 
of States to do that--said: We want no part of it. We want to educate 
our kids the way we think we should, and not have these burdens that I 
will talk about in just a minute.
  So more than 2 years after this legislation was passed, parents are 
still struggling to understand the basics of the law, especially when 
they learn about terms such as ``annual yearly progress'' and ``failing 
school.'' As a parent, people want the best for their children. It is 
disturbing to be told

[[Page S4235]]

that the school their child attends is now considered failing.
  As a result of this legislation, as my colleagues can see on this 
second chart I have, we have come up with some terms but hardly anyone 
understands them. In this glossary of terms, AYP--we will see that a 
lot--adequate yearly progress is a minimum level of improvement that 
school districts and schools must achieve each year as determined under 
the Federal No Child Left Behind Act.
  Individualized educational plans are specific goals set by an 
educational team for a special education student and includes any 
special supports that are needed to help achieve these goals.
  We can run through this whole list of definitions: Safe harbor, a 
provision intended for schools and districts that are making progress, 
at least 10 percent, in student achievement but are not yet making 
adequate yearly progress targets goals. It is designed to prevent the 
over identification of schools not making adequate yearly progress.
  The definitions are unbelievably difficult. The people back in 
Washington do not understand them. The people in Nevada certainly do 
not understand them, nor do people around the rest of the country.
  I have tried to help improve this legislation by introducing and 
supporting measures that will help, not hurt, our most vulnerable 
educational communities. I will give an example. Every day in Nevada, 
rural communities are confronted by a shortage of resources. We have 17 
counties in Nevada. We have one county, Esmeralda County, that does not 
have 1,000 people living in it, and it is a pretty good size county. We 
have some schools that are very sparsely populated. We only have two 
counties that are heavily populated. Clark, I have talked about, that 
70 percent of the people live there, and 20 percent in the metropolitan 
area of Washoe County. That leaves 10 percent of the people around the 
rest of the State.

  It may surprise some people to know that there are still small towns 
in rural America where the citizens wait for a doctor to make rounds or 
a mail truck to drop off mail. These families have elected to stay in 
their communities despite all the obstacles, and they deserve an 
opportunity to enjoy a good quality of life.
  We have rural schools in Clark County. My home is in Searchlight, NV. 
I am very fortunate the school there is named after me. It is not a 
very big school. There are about 50 kids in it, grades 1-6, but in 
Clark County we have schools that are rural schools. In Nevada, we 
still have one-room schools. So we are concerned about what is 
happening in rural America.
  I have not traveled to Minnesota very much. After they immigrated to 
this country, my in-laws settled in Minnesota, and I know that a lot of 
very small communities are in Minnesota. People think of Minnesota as 
Minneapolis and St. Paul, but I am confident there are a lot of rural 
communities, just like in Nevada. That is why I introduced legislation 
entitled ``Assisting America's Rural Schools Act'' that addressed the 
concerns of rural school systems trying to comply with the teacher 
quality standards set by No Child Left Behind.
  When I went to school in Searchlight, we had one teacher who taught 
all eight grades. There is a small town in Nevada called Austin in 
Lander County. It is a community much like the one I was raised in. 
Austin boasts a total of 63 students in grades K-12. For grades 6-12, 
there are only three teachers for all subjects. These teachers are 
considered highly qualified in science, English, math, and physical 
education. In order for Austin to acquire a teacher who is highly 
qualified in the subject of history, the local education agency must 
either find and recruit another teacher or send one of its three 
current teachers back to school to get accredited in history via 
distance learning.
  Unfortunately, Lander County does not have the money to do any of 
this. The issue is not whether teachers in rural areas should be 
qualified to teach multiple subjects. They should. However, requiring 
them to obtain highly qualified status in all subjects simultaneously 
is unreasonable.
  So my legislation gave rural school systems some flexibility in 
meeting the definition of a highly qualified teacher without 
diminishing high accountability standards for teachers. Rural school 
districts would be able to give a one-year exemption to any teacher who 
is already qualified in at least one core academic subject. A highly 
qualified teacher who is working toward that certification in another 
subject can still teach both subjects. The Department of Education 
adopted the principle of this bill last month.

  The Secretary of Education came to Reno and made that announcement. 
Teachers in eligible rural school districts who are highly qualified in 
at least one subject will now have 3 years to become highly qualified. 
I am certain rural school districts and teachers are relieved the 
administration recognized the burden No Child Left Behind had placed 
and they recognized that my legislation was important.
  That was just one of the many glitches in this mammoth bill. How many 
more will we face in years to come? Superintendent Jim Hager--I have 
talked about him--is responsible for 60,000 students in Washoe County. 
He gave an honest assessment of what is going on with the Leave No 
Child Behind Act throughout the State, and probably every other State. 
One of his chief frustrations is that all students who come into the 
Nevada school system are facing formidable challenges--learning 
disabilities, language barriers, or influences beyond their control 
attributed to their living conditions.
  These challenges are significant and oftentimes the school system is 
intended to be the primary system to fix, help, or remove these 
obstacles. No Child Left Behind expects these school districts to turn 
these troubled children into top flight students within 1 year without 
receiving full funding from the Federal Government to do so.
  If the schools do not turn these children around in a timely manner, 
they go on what is called a watch list, a badge that is not good, a 
badge these schools have to wear. This badge puts these schools on the 
verge of being branded failure.
  Let me show a chart that depicts Clark County's failing school cells. 
If we look here, we will find in the Clark County school district where 
the problems are. If we look across, we will find that white kids are 
doing just very nicely. They are doing very fine. The schools that are 
mostly white have no problem, but if we go to a school that is 
Hispanic, there is a problem. Every place we see the red, which is 
failure, is Hispanic--one, two, three, four, five categories, and if we 
look at other minorities, African Americans, the same thing. I think 
this is a glaring example of why this legislation is bad.
  It would be nice if you had a school which represented the percentage 
of people within the community, but that is not how schools are. We 
find in Nevada, as every place else, schools that are heavily Hispanic. 
You have schools that have large numbers of African-American children. 
In these schools, these people who are teaching have problems with 
language arts.
  Let's say you have somebody starting school who has bad English. The 
way I look at this, even though my skin is white, I look at every one 
of these problems here as me. When I grew up, my parents were 
uneducated. They were not dumb; they were uneducated. My father never 
even graduated from the 8th grade. My mother never even graduated from 
high school.
  I would have been part of this failing school system. If they had 
tried to test me out of the schools then, I couldn't have made it. It 
is just like a lot of these children.
  These children here are not dumb. They have social problems. Maybe 
their parents didn't graduate from the 8th grade. Maybe their parents 
didn't graduate from high school. Maybe they don't have both parents at 
home. That doesn't mean they are dumb. Maybe what these children need, 
rather than a badge that they are in a failing school is extra help. 
That has not happened.
  I believe we should hold our teachers and students accountable. But 
if we expect them to achieve miracles without providing the resources 
they need, we are setting them up for failure. That is what this bill 
has done. It is not helping children learn and it is not helping 
teachers teach.
  Testing a child to make him learn is like weighing a steer to make 
him gain weight. By weighing a steer, he doesn't

[[Page S4236]]

gain weight. You have to feed him. That is how you get a steer to gain 
weight. Testing a child to make him learn is the same thing. You can't 
test a child into being proficient in English or Spanish.
  The No Child Left Behind Act is having a ripple effect throughout the 
State of Nevada and throughout the country. That is why I am going to 
sit down with every county superintendent in the State next month and 
ask them what needs to be fixed. I think I know, but I want to hear 
them. I want them to have the opportunity to speak to me. We need 
relief in Nevada, and if we have to do it bit by bit we will. But this 
law as it stands puts our educational system in peril.
  Nevada is not the only State that has problems. I was pleased the 
Department of Education adopted the principle of this bill last month, 
as I said. But if we look at the failing school system--look at another 
chart I have. Look at this one. This really, as far as I am concerned, 
is showing that it is pathetically horrible.
  You can have a school that meets every criterion that is important 
under the No Child Left Behind Act--except one. Everything is just 
fine. But if there is limited English proficiency in that school, they 
are a failing school. If everything else is fine but they have limited 
English proficiency, they are given the red badge and now they are held 
up to being a failing school.
  It is because they have children in the school who have come to 
school not being able to speak very good English. They are not dumb. 
They deserve an education. The No Child Left Behind Act is having a 
ripple effect throughout Nevada and throughout the Nation.

  Nevada is not the only State having difficulties implementing this 
law; it is a national problem. Thousands of school districts are 
already trying to juggle school construction costs, increase graduation 
rates, find money for textbooks that they don't have. Reducing class 
sizes is impossible. They are figuring out what to do about overcrowded 
schools.
  During the April recess I spoke with concerned citizens of Nevada. I 
went to several schools in what I call my Capitol Classroom program. I 
talked about overcrowded schools. There is one high school in Clark 
County with about 5,000 students in it. There are others almost that 
big: a high school with 5,000 students. More than 70 percent of our 
Nation's high schools have 1,500 or more students.
  When the President signed the No Child Left Behind Act, he signaled 
his support for programs that were supposed to help students learn, 
including smaller schools and smaller classes. In contrast to that 
promise, in this year's budget the President zeros out the Smaller 
Learning Communities Program--zero.
  I had the good fortune at one time in my career to be chairman of the 
Democratic Policy Committee. We had one of our retreats up in 
Wilmington, DE. I brought in there a woman by the name of Deborah 
Meyer. She was from New York. Deborah Meyer was a school principal of a 
big school in New York, an elementary school. Her kids were doing so 
awful that she decided to go to the school authorities and she said: 
Look, this is not working. Trust me. I want to try something. I want to 
take this school and, instead of having one school, we are going to 
have four schools. We are going to have four principals, four separate 
faculties, four separate lunch hours--everything is going to be like a 
separate school.
  The school administrators said: We have nothing to lose. You are 
doing so bad you can't do any worse than you have done.
  She did that and within one quarter, in 3 months, the scores had 
risen in every category and Deborah Meyer has become famous because of 
that and she has gone other places and tried the same thing. We need to 
understand smaller schools help.
  Senator Bingaman and I, along with 14 other colleagues, sent a letter 
to the labor subcommittee requesting funding be restored. Not enough, 
but $200 million in the Smaller Learning Communities Program. We really 
need that.
  The President has been given bad advice by the budgeteers down there. 
Common sense tells us students do best when they receive plenty of 
personal attention from their teachers. Studies tell us the same thing. 
According to the Department of Education, research suggests that 
positive outcomes associated with smaller schools stem from their 
ability to have close, personal environments where teachers can work 
with a small set of students, challenging and inspiring them.
  They build big schools because it is cheaper. Smaller learning 
communities can achieve in different ways: small learning centers, core 
academics, magnet programs, schools within a school, as I have just 
described. It would seem to me, if this administration really wanted to 
help our teachers teach and help our students learn they wouldn't be 
trying to eliminate a program like this, to create smaller learning 
communities, which have been proven to do just that.
  I touched only on a few things tonight dealing with problems of the 
No Child Left Behind Act. It is going to take a lot of work to improve 
this bill and make it what it promised to be, a tool that will help 
teachers and students in every public school in America. It is a 
difficult job but we must keep our promise to America's children. We 
can't afford to leave them behind.

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