Public schools rail against No Child Left Behind because it requires all students to be proficient in math and reading by 2015. Wake County’s 100 percent graduation goal falls into the same logical dilemma.
The architects of No Child Left Behind reasoned that setting a proficiency goal of less than 100 percent would make it appear that the schools were allowed to give up on a certain percentage of students. Did they really believe that all students would be able to achieve the proficiency goal? Probably not. But in politics, favorable public perception usually outweighs candidness.
In 2005, the News & Observer examined the 100 percent proficiency goal set by No Child Left Behind. Here is a key passage from the August 21st article:
Even as schools make progress with the most challenging students, some educators are willing to say publicly what others are voicing only in private: Having every student pass won’t happen.
“It’s a goal that everybody would love for us to be able to achieve, but I don’t think that it’s very realistic,” said Eddie Davis, president of the N.C. Association of Educators, which represents 70,000 teachers. “We do want every single child who is able to operate at grade level to do that.”
Insert “graduate” in place of “pass” and you will get an accurate representation of how most educators feel about Wake County’s graduation goal.
