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Under the newest federal K-12 education law, parents will get more information about schools
The Every Student Succeeds Act replaces No Child Left Behind, the controversial plan that caused upheaval in some schools.
by Dale Mezzacappa, thenotebook.org
Within the next two years, parents and advocates will get significantly more information about their schools and school districts, going far beyond demographics and test scores to include reporting on everything from absenteeism rates to new details about how schools spend their money.
That is a result of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), the newest incarnation of the main K-12 federal education law. ESSA is the successor to the previous reauthorization, dubbed No Child Left Behind (NCLB), the 2002 legislation that imposed a highly controversial accountability and intervention regime on schools that required annual testing, mandated that results be disaggregated by student subgroups, and caused upheaval in schools that were not making the grade.
The federal government’s control over education is minimal, but its influence is substantial. Both NCLB and now ESSA are reauthorizations of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the major federal education law signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1965. At that time, Johnson said that the “first national goal” should be “educational opportunity for all.”
The law is reauthorized periodically, funneling money to low-income schools and districts and setting conditions for use of the money, with the goal of affecting state policy regarding equity and excellence.
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