Where their teacher-quality proposals are concerned, the fates of the 11 states that have bid for waivers of core principles of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act appear to depend largely on how the peer reviewers--and, ultimately, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan--interpret their applications. The U.S. Department of Education's criteria…

The author reports on a measure to renew the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), which faces steep political hurdles. Leaders of the Senate education committee still aim to push a bipartisan revision of the much-criticized No Child Left Behind Act through Congress by year's end, in time to stave off the Obama administration's move to…

From the White House to Capitol Hill, the winners in this week's elections won't have much time to savor their victories. Even as federal policymakers sort out the political landscape, the remainder of 2012 and the early months of 2013 are likely to be dominated by divisive, unresolved issues with broad consequences for K-12 and higher…

A growing number of school districts--including large ones like those in Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Hawaii--have become recent converts to new principal-evaluation systems that tie school leaders' appraisals to student test scores. As of this school year, student achievement accounts for 40 percent to 50 percent of principals' evaluations…

With just months to go until the nation's overhauled K-12 law goes into effect, state policymakers are still scrambling to firm up the infrastructure for their education systems, under the new blueprint laid out in the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). They're doing it at a time of political change and policy uncertainty at the national level,…

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, who says he plans to serve in the Obama Cabinet for the "long haul," has begun sketching out his priorities for the next four years. They include using competitive levers to improve teacher and principal quality and holding the line on initiatives he started during the president's first term. The…

After more than a year of heated campaigning, President Barack Obama remains in the White House, Democrats continue to control the U.S. Senate, and Republicans are still in charge of the House of Representatives--leaving unchanged a political landscape that has paralyzed congressional action on education policy and led the president to flex his…

The author reports on a long-stalled, bipartisan rewrite of the No Child Left Behind Act approved by the Senate education committee which faces steep political hurdles, including opposition from civil rights and business leaders who see it as a step back on student and school accountability and from Republican lawmakers who say it does not pull…

Even though 34 states and the District of Columbia have No Child Left Behind Act waivers in hand, many of them are still negotiating with the U.S. Department of Education over their teacher evaluation systems--a crucial component if they want to keep their newfound flexibility. More than six months after waiver recipients turned in their…

Given the flexibility to revise their academic goals under the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, a vast majority of the states that received federal waivers are setting different expectations for different subgroups of students, an "Education Week" analysis shows. That marks a dramatic shift in policy and philosophy from the original law.…

The latest batch of states seeking relief under the No Child Left Behind Act dodge pitfalls that tripped up the first round of applicants. In the latest round of applications for waivers under the No Child Left Behind Act, states have learned lessons from their predecessors and dodged pitfalls that triggered some big revisions from first-round…

If Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney wins the November election, his ascension could endanger--or dismantle--key Obama administration education initiatives and lead to a slimmed-down and less activist U.S. Department of Education. Scaled back Education Department and cloudy prospects for Obama initiatives are among the scenarios. But…

As the clock ticks toward President Barack Obama's back-to-school deadline for rewriting the No Child Left Behind Act, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is preparing to grant states relief from key provisions of the federal school accountability law in exchange for what he calls "commitments to key reforms." The move comes as…

Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives appear determined to make deep cuts to education and related programs in the temporary spending bill that would keep the federal government operating for the rest of the fiscal year, even as President Barack Obama seeks a modest funding boost next year. That sets up a fiscal face-off in the…

Across the country, high school graduation rates are bemoaned with regularity. Many states and districts aren't even tracking the rate for the fastest-growing population of students, or if they are, they aren't telling the public how many English-language learners (ELLs) are leaving school with a diploma. The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act was…