Source Note: “Race, inequality, and educational accountability: the irony of ‘No Child Left Behind’”

March 13, 2009 in Research Project

Title: “Race, inequality, and educational accountability: the irony of ‘No Child Left Behind’”

Summary: Education policy researcher believes No Child Left Behind is harming

Topic: Should the Obama Administration reform the No Child Left Behind Act?

Category: Academic; Research Essay

Publication Information: Race Ethnicity and Education, Sep 2007, Vol 10 Issue  3, p245-260

Author: Linda Darling-Hammond

Location: EBSCOhost

Accessed: March 12, 2009

Support:

● Pushing out at-risk students: an analysis of high school discharge figures—a joint report by AFC and the Public Advocate, Advocates for Children (2002): The report found that in New York City public schools alone, 55,000 high school students were ejected from school during the 2000-2001 school year. Darling-Hammond suggests this is evidence of public schools intentionally abandoning low-performing students in order to better their evaluations under standardized assessments.

● Deconstructing the school to prison pipeline, M. Wald and D. Losen (2003): Wald and Losen identified an increase in the number of students who, due to neglect by the educational system, transition from high school straight into the correctional system. Darling-Hammond argues this is a result of schools indirectly punishing underperforming students for low overall scores on standardized tests.

Audience and Agenda: Race, Ethnicity and Education is an academic journal of education policy as it relates to issues of social inequality, published by Routledge (UK). Linda-Darling Hammond is presently the Charles Ducommon Professor of Education at Stanford University’s School of Education, and an expert in the field of education policy reform. Her research is primarily focused in the area of educational equity, and she is the author of several books on the subject including The Right to Learn (1997, Jossey-Bass), which won the 1998 American Educational Research Association’s Outstanding Book Award. She was one of the Obama Administration’s candidates for the post of Secretary of Education (which eventually went to Arne Duncan, formerly the CEO of Chicago Public Schools.)

Usefulness: As one of the nation’s leading experts on inequality in education, Darling-Hammond’s analysis of the social ramifications of NCLB are incredibly valuable to the overall scope of my research project. Her examination of the impact of school accountability requirements on students from disadvantaged backgrounds provides an argument for “reform” that is unique in my research thus far.

Works cited:

“Race, Ethnicity and Education,” http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/carfax/13613324.html

“Stanford University School of Education,” http://ed.stanford.edu/suse/faculty/displayRecord.php?suid=ldh

“The New Team – Linda Darling-Hammond,” http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/02/us/politics/02web-darlinghammond.html

Advertisement