NPIEN Calls for NCLB Reform

The National Pacific Islander Educator Network (NPIEN) joined with other civil rights organizations in calling for reform of the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law. A letter, drafted originally by the Forum on Educational Accountability, calls for "multiple forms of assessment” and “multiple measures or indicators of student progress” in legislation currently being drafted to overhaul the controversial “No Child Left Behind” (NCLB) federal education law. In the letter, delivered to members of the Senate and House education committees, the groups wrote, “If education is to improve in the United States, schools must be assessed in ways that produce high-quality learning and that create incentives to keep students in school.”

“A number of studies have found that an exclusive emphasis on (primarily multiple-choice) standardized test scores has narrowed the curriculum. An unintended consequence has been to create incentives for schools to boost scores by keeping or pushing low-scoring students out of school. Push-out incentives and the narrowed curriculum are especially severe for special needs students, English language learners, and students without strong family supports.”Among the arguments made for including multiple measures: attention will be given to a comprehensive academic program and a more complete array of learning outcomes; higher-order thinking and performance skills can be assessed; checks and balances will be added to ensure that emphasizing one measure does not come at the expense of other important educational goals; and schools will be encouraged to attend to the progress of students at every point of the achievement spectrum, not just those near a test cut-point labeled “proficient,” the letter concluded.

The full list of organizations that have signed the letter: ACORN, Advancement Project, Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, ASPIRA Association, Civil Rights Project, Council for Exceptional Children, Japanese American Citizens League, Justice Matters, League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), Learning Disabilities Association of America, National Alliance of Black School Educators (NABSE), National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc., National Association for Asian Pacific American Education, National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE), National Association for the Education and Advancement of Cambodian, Laotian, and Vietnamese Americans (NAFEA), National Coalition of ESEA Title I Parents, National Council on Educating Black Children, National Federation of Filipino American Associations, National Indian Education Association, National Indian School Board Association, National Pacific Islander Educator Network (NPIEN), National Urban Alliance for Effective Education (NUA).

Speaking from personal experience, and as one who is still trying to pass the multiple-choice ham radio operator test :), if it were not for multiple measures, I would not have earned any of my college degrees. For the families of many first generation immigrant high school and college students, it is difficult to comprehend the rigor associated with academia. To rely on a single type of measure, then declare that a student is not academically proficient, when they have given their best effort despite numerous obstacles including language, disability, culture, and lack of access, will only doom many to give up on the American educational dream.