States are grappling with a federal requirement that is forcing them to use a new, more uniform method of calculating high school graduation rates--a method that, in some states, is yielding rates that are 20 percentage points lower than those states have reported in the past. Under a 2008 update to federal education rules, the states were…

Four months after President Barack Obama made education a centerpiece of his State of the Union address, lawmakers charged with reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act are beginning to sketch out their own visions for aspects of the law's renewal. The prospects that Congress will meet the president's goal--a comprehensive,…

School districts and educators chafing under the mandates of the No Child Left Behind Act are hoping to prod the U.S. Department of Education into giving them a reprieve from the provisions they see as most onerous, as the prospects for an overhaul of the law by Congress anytime soon remain cloudy. The Obama administration and congressional…

Although U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan ultimately decides which states get relief from key requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act, a group of outside judges will wield tremendous influence in deciding states' fates. With states facing compliance deadlines under the law and Congress moving slowly on reauthorizing the Elementary and…

The Obama administration will waive cornerstone requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act, including the 2014 deadline for all students to be proficient in math and reading/language arts, and will give states the freedom to set their own student-achievement goals and design their own interventions for failing schools. In exchange for that…

The author reports on some $800 million in money set aside for Supplemental Education Services which is being freed up under the Obama administration's NCLB waiver plan. The U.S. Department of Education's plan to grant states broad flexibility under the No Child Left Behind Act will free up as much as $800 million in money school districts now…

With 2014 approaching as the deadline by which states must get all their students up to "proficient" levels on state tests, a study released last week by the U.S. Department of Education's top statistics agency suggests that some states may have lowered student-proficiency standards on such tests in recent years. For the 47-state study,…

States jockey for position as the U.S. Education Department readies billions of dollars in "Race to the Top" awards--the stimulus program's grand prize. Even before they've finished spending their first block of federal stimulus aid, states are getting a head start in a national "race to the top" for better public education,…

Many of the states that claim to have large shares of their students reaching proficiency in reading and mathematics under the No Child Left Behind Act have set less stringent standards for meeting that threshold than lower-performing states, a new federal study finds. The study, "Mapping 2005 State Proficiency Standards Onto the NAEP…

With the federal No Child Left Behind Act underscoring the wide variation in what states demand of their students, people on both sides of the political aisle are again making the case for national standards, curricula, and tests. It wasn't so long ago--during the Clinton and George H.W. Bush administrations--that similar proposals went down in…

The goal of the No Child Left Behind Act is simply stated: All children should be proficient in reading and mathematics by the end of the 2013-2014 school year. More than five years after the law was enacted, it remains unclear what "proficient" means. Because the federal law gives the states the power to define proficiency, there are 50…

Now that a high-profile and potentially influential panel has released its detailed proposal for revising the No Child Left Behind Act, the Bush administration and education groups are waiting to hear from the institution that matters most, Congress. The Aspen Institute's Commission on No Child Left Behind unveiled 75 recommendations for changes…

The number of schools that have failed to make "adequate yearly progress" under the federal No Child Left Behind Act is proving to be a moving target, as states clean up erroneous data and grant appeals to schools that challenge the unwanted label. Under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act that aims to raise students academic…

Depending on who's talking, the Bush administration's signature education law either imposes an onerous financial burden on schools or provides enough aid for states and schools to administer it. This article discusses the study released by the Ohio Department of Education estimating that the state will spend about $1.5 billion a year to meet the…

This article discusses the increasing number of schools that met all of their 2004 annual achievement targets under U.S. federal law. Over half the states released at least preliminary lists of the number of schools that had made adequate yearly progress under the No Child Left Behind Act, based on 2003-04 test data. In general, the percentage of…