CEA joins No Child Left Behind opposition

The Connecticut Education Association (CEA) joined the National Education Association (NEA) and various school districts across the country to bring a lawsuit against President Bush's No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) on April 20.

According to CNN.com, the other plaintiffs in the case are nine school districts in Michigan, Texas and Vermont, plus 10 NEA chapters in those three states as well as Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Utah.

According to the Associated Press, a recent analysis by Connecticut education officials found the state will have to spend $41.6 million in state money for staff, program and development costs to meet the law's mandates through 2008. Hundreds of millions more in costs are expected to be picked up by local districts.

The tenets of the law state the costs related to new programs required by the act will be provided to the states by the federal government.

Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal began publicizing his plans to pursue a lawsuit against the act earlier this month and still plans to file another suit against the act in addition to the one just filed.

A press release from the CEA said Blumenthal's suit will focus primarily on the testing aspect of the act, while the suit already filed will focus on broader issues, specifically the fact "that Washington should pay for implementing all its NCLB regulations."

Though the lawsuit is already spewing controversy throughout the country, it has some followers here at UConn.

Richard Schwab, dean of the Neag School of Education, said the NCLB Act has had the biggest impact on teachers in the classroom.

"There is a big emphasis on testing and assessment and that's affecting how students are looking at the profession," he said.

Since the Connecticut lawsuit has yet to be filed, Schwab said he hopes the two parties can work out their differences before it comes to that.

"We should spend money getting new teachers in the classrooms and not on litigation," he said.

"There's a lot of concern expressed by teachers about the act," Schwab said. "They're worried that because there's so much emphasis on standardized testing that there isn't the opportunity to do enrichment opportunities. They also worry that there's so little time to be creative in the classroom that it hurts their teaching."

Schwab said one of the law's weakest points is the fact it treats all students the same, regardless of special needs individual students may have.

"We know you can't apply one set of standards to a whole group," he said.

Arthur Dimock is an adjunct chemistry professor at UConn. Through outreach programs around the state, he is able to interact with students at the elementary and high school level.

The outreach programs Dimock is involved in are conducted at no cost to the schools, but Dimock said the NCLB Act has pulled away funding for many other worthy school programs.

"Losing our ability to challenge and excite the high end students may have a serious consequence down the road -- both for the development of a strong pool of candidates for our colleges and universities and for society in general," Dimock said.

Dimock also said the overall effect of the NCLB Act thus far has been to take money away from programs put in place to address educational concerns that were "developing a successful track record."

"This 'one size fits all' federal mandate does a disservice to states that were being successful without the legislation," he said. "For these reasons, I applaud the attorney general's effort to fight implementation of certain requirements of the Act."

Dean of the UConn Fine Arts Department David Woods also finds fault with the act.

At a fine arts department conference last November, "Developing a Positive Future for Music Education," Woods talked about the negative effect it was having on music education in his speech, "Teaching/Learning in Music - Positive Steps Forward."

"It is my observation and opinion that the local interpretation of the Federal No Child Left Behind education law is seriously effecting access to music education for America 's public school students," Woods said.

"Although the law identifies the arts as a core subject area, testing requirements in literacy, math and science are forcing local districts to divert resources and funding away from other subjects, such as the arts," Woods said.

"The problem is that most districts become focused on those subject areas that will be assessed and tested and disregard the fact that literacy goes beyond reading and writing," Woods said.

Woods also said the School of Fine Arts is already feeling the effects of the NCLB Act.

"Our students come to us without as strong a background as they used to have simply because the courses aren't there in the high schools," Woods said.

The act, which affects not only the students of elementary and high schools but faculty and staff that work there as well, has hit close to home for Woods.

"I do know individuals who are out in the field who have lost their jobs because music or art education has been cancelled, and it really has impacted music education in elementary and secondary schools," he said.

Woods said UConn has had to make changes already to adjust to the levels students are coming to school with.

"We've had to do more remedial courses, working with our students more to work up to the level they should be at," he said. "Its not only at UConn, its all over."

Though the act is problematic for educators across the country, as well as in Connecticut, Woods said he doesn't think the attorney general's lawsuit will do much to alleviate the problem.

"I don't know if it will impact what is going on right now," he said. "It seems to me that we need to see change at the federal level in positive ways rather than bringing lawsuits against the federal government."