Education

My children were in elementary with No Child Left Behind. My son loved geography. It was the subject that he talked about when he came home from school. Read More >

I am a social worker and work with kids from homeless backgrounds. I have watched public education become geared to standardized testing. This has turned education upside down. A typical 3rd grader spends most of their time preparing for testing. Areas of learning like poetry, etc. are dropped. Read More >

I volunteer at West Middle School in District 11. It is such a dichotomy as some schools have a lot of funding and some have none. I take at-risk students outside to Garden of the Gods and to the Sand Dunes. What we do is their only escape from the indoors. Without this exposure, I can see their attention spans shrinking. They are not learning about what they are interested in school. Then, if they do not do well, their school gets less funding and the problem gets worse.

I am a high school student. No Child Left Behind has meant no extra funding, all the money goes to special education. AP classes have not had new books for 10 years. We couldn't get funding for buses to go on a field trip to the Capitol for AP Government. All the money went to laptops for kids who couldn't afford them. More students are going into the remedial classes just to get the resources. Read More >

I am opposed to No Child Left Behind legislation because it does not address the needs of children. Several years ago, I served as a building principal in a extremely poor community on the Navajo reservation. Many of the students did not have running water. During this time, I observed how being labeled as a "failing school" affects students, staff and administrators. Read More >