Children are the Losers in No Child Left Behind

The MSA scores were released on June 29. While most counties saw improvements, Baltimore City did not. In 2009 and 2008, the city school system saw increases in its scores. However, these were also the years several schools were accused of cheating on the MSAs when teachers changed the students' answers.

Baltimore City isn't alone. All across the country, teachers are feeling major pressure for their students to do well on standardize tests. Since No Child Left Behind has been enacted, many teachers are only judged upon how their students perform on these tests. Classroom observations by administrators have fallen by the wayside and renewed contracts and raises are highly connected to test scores.

While curriculum may have not changed, teachers find themselves teaching to the test. They feverishly try to cram a year's worth of work into seven months. The students who struggle with certain concepts are often left to flounder because there is no time for review and an extra day of multiplication tables. Writing enters almost every subject, including math, music and physical education. Because you see on the MSAs, students need to be able to explain in writing how they arrived at their answer.

March arrives and the tests are adminstered. Teachers are stressed, praying that their students will do well enough. Some goes as far as erasing wrong answers and penciling in the right ones. Other teachers stand before their students and tell them the correct answers to the questions.

With two and half months of school left, teachers don't know what to do with their so-called freedom. Instead of teaching students valuable lessons they will need in the next grade, many teachers fill the weeks with busy week, relieved that they won't have to teach to the test until the next school year begins.

The students are the ones who are losing is this situation. First, they are taught that if they know the questions on the test, they will succeed. This is setting up an unrealistic expectation. Life simply doesn't work like this. Second, students don't have the privilege to really learn concepts. Teachers are teaching at the speed of light. If they don't get it the first time, there is very little hope that someone will sit down with them and help them get it the second time. Third, they could possibly witness their teacher sinking to new lows and thinking that cheating is acceptable.

No Child Left Behind was supposed to mean just that -- no child would be left behind. I think that is exactly what is happening when so much focus is put on standardized test scores. The children are getting left behind.