By Dr. D. Jackson Maxwell
Every day on the news you can hear a rant on how schools are failing our nation’s youth. Demonizing teachers has become the latest rage by the powers that be. The new reality of education is public schools, charter schools, and private schools are all competing for the same pool of students, pitting local and regional school systems against each other. Children have been monetized with each Shelby County student being worth about $12K to whichever school system they choose. With new federal directives and budgetary proposals, these trends are accelerating to included public funding for private schools. Policies for school districts are being increasingly dictated from on high by politicians while teachers’ unions are being dismantled. How did we get here?
Beginning with the publication of Rudolf Flesh’s seminal 1955 book Why Johnny Can’t Read, the modern era of school reform was born. This book created the debate over how to best teach reading — sight words versus phonics. Local school boards picked sides, adopted their chosen methodology, and bought the pre-packaged, vendor created “fix-it” educational materials to begin the resurrection of their failing schools. The federal government joined the cause in subsequent decades as they poured money into the nation’s school systems.
In 1979, Public Law 96-98 was signed by President Carter creating the U. S. Department of Education and the growth of federal involvement in public education exploded. During the Reagan years, the National Commission on Excellence in Education released A Nation at Risk (1983) that concluded once again our school systems were failing. As a result, the Reagan administration sought to decrease the direct role of the federal government by shifting governance of education to the states while increasing overall federal funding. The administration added the caveat that current student shortcomings were a result of the pervasiveness of negative cultural factors such as drugs, alcohol, and crime. Thus, the “Just Say No” campaign lead by First Lady Nancy Reagan was born. Simultaneously, across the nation governors urged state legislators to initiate a variety of reforms aimed at changing local educational policy.
President Bill Clinton’s primary educational reform efforts were a matter of expanding the Reagan/Bush era policies through a program called Goals 2000. These initiatives became increasingly focused on creating state standards that emphasized performance tied to academic goals. States were once again enticed to develop and adopt standards by the offer of federal funding via grants. This federal influence in determining state education policies continued to grow.
Following the work of his predecessors, George W. Bush signed into law what was to prove to be the sledgehammer of reform, the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB). The primary goals mandated by NCLB were that every teacher must be highly qualified (degrees and accreditations current) and all students must be 100% proficient in all core subject areas. NCLB firmly established the federal government as the driving force in educational policy and programming, going so far as to force states to meet proficiency standards. In the name of equity of achievement, all students (minority/nonminority, advantaged/ disadvantaged) are compelled to take annual competency tests to assess progress.
President Obama attempted to tweak the more egregious stipulations of NCLB. One change was allowing states, who were actively engaged in reform efforts to receive a waiver whereby they did not have to meet the mandate of 100% of students proficient in all core subjects. Additionally, the Obama administration provided more funding for targeted areas such as educational research and Title I schools.
Today, ESSA rules the educational landscape. The 2015 Every Student Succeeds Act replaced NCLB. ESSA curtailed much of the federal government’s involvement in state level education decisions. While the Washington still mandates accountability in the areas of English language proficiency, academic proficiency, and graduation rates, states are given greater leeway. For example, states can now choose their own educational goals and the pathway to achieving them.
So, the pendulum has swung away from federal control toward state governance. It is now Tennessee’s legislators and governor who are taking control of local school districts’ issues and dictating educational policy. So this is how we have gotten here. Now all that remains, is to see what comes next!
Dr. D. Jackson Maxwell is a National Board Certified Teacher and educational consultant with over 30 years of experience. Please forward questions or comments to: djacksonmaxwell@gmail.com
