I agree with Senator Obama. We need quality teachers and that means higher teacher pay. Senator Obama is also right to call for politicians to work with teachers to create high standards for our classrooms. I urge ALL candidates to discuss in detail their views on No Child Left Behind. We need specifics in this debate.

The first half of Obama's answer was the usual boring talk we hear from all the democratic candidates - that no child left behind is a failure, etc.

The last minute and half of the answer, however, was great - Obama presented a great new idea (and I've heard pretty much every idea that every candidate throws out there on most issues, but I had never heard this) that ties together two important campaign issues: energy independence and education. More than that, I think there might be two parts to his point, one subtle and one obvious.

The first part is that we need kids to go into science and engineering, and energy independence is a good motivator. The second, subtle part is that if we have a president who can once again inspire the youth like JFK, we'll be twice as effective in the first part - and truly will be able to create a movement around energy independence that will probably spread to other needed economic arenas.

well, I can only speak to the situation here in Los Angeles area. Some of the most rundown overcrowded low-income areas of the valley have some of the top performing schools. Look up Taft High School. It is truly impressive. The teachers and administration are absolutely amazing. On the other hand, I live in a affluent white community that is pathetic. The teachers are uninspired and cynical. The dumbing down is absurd. They actually admit that they still have 8th - 12th graders doing cut and paste and posters and coloring and "creative" projects in order to give the less scholarly students a chance to bring their grades up. So basically the parents are driving around to the craft stores and standing out in the garage with spray paint and glue and sawing out stryofoam tombstones. The essay is almost a second thought as the student is so overwhelmed by all the "art" required to the project. Basically, by the end of the year, you just want to sniff the $30 glue you had to purchase and throw all the shit out the window. My kids have always been in GATE or AP or Honors classes and they are even dumbed down there. I finally made a switch to a new district and am hoping to see some changes. Maybe I should move to the barrios in the Valley and give them a shot.

Sen. Obama --

The entire school system in this country is broken, and has been for many decades. It needs a total remake, from top to bottom, not more bandaids on mortal wounds, which is the kindest thing that can be said of NCLB.

First of all, students should not be warehoused in schools until they are 17-18 years old. They should be out and working, or going to college, by the time they're 16. The 11th grade was only instituted a little less than 100 years ago and the 12th grade wasn't added until 1937 -- primarily to deal with problems caused by youths who were wandering around, jobless (this was during the Depression), and directionless.

Stop making schools the dumping grounds for all of society's problems. Going to a system similar to those in Europe, where children receive a basic education until they're 13, then directing them toward a career path OF THEIR OWN CHOSING, would go a long way in eliminating the behavioral problems plaguing our schools, especially the middle schools and high schools.

Career choices such as technical, vocational, and artistic could be offered in conjunction with similar industries, businesses, and insstitutions -- all who (supposedly) claim that there exists a dearth of qualified candidates to fill job openings in the US.

Kids don't want to be in a place where their time is wasted. And they're no different from adults, in that respect.

NCLB is just more tail-waggi­ng-the-dog and is ensuring that we win (or lose, depending on your perspective) the race to the bottom in education, worldwide.

I think schools are asked to do too much...the­ir job or mission is to educate, not be psychologists,cops, and whatever eles they are being asked to do. And their hands are tied with too many mandates. Most of this is the result of being in a system with no competition, which I know is an evil word to liberals. Make all of the schools private and have them compete for students and dollars!
Having seen both public and private schools in action with my own kids I can attest to this.
We took my daughter out of the public schools after her teacher failed with her. I sat with this woman and she told me flat out that spelling wasn't important.­(not that mine is any good either). We also noted lots of discipline problems in the school.
The next year we put her in a private school and magically spelling was important and her grades soared...s­he was made to do homework every day and if it was missing there would be a call to the parents. There was also a strict disiplinary policy...o­ne strike and you are out!..and we saw it in action. One of her classmates was rather violent and disruptive. When he finally beat up another student he was brought to the frnt door. His parents were called and one of them picked him up with the instruction that he was no longer a student...­PERIOD. The performance of all of the children was great. Also absent in the curriculum was all of the politically correct BS that somehow my daughter survived without learning.

The frame of the debate is all wrong.

Everybody looks at student scores and then talks about which schools are failing. It's as if the only variable is the quality of the adult employees. That's the mistake. That's the error in framing (besides the fact we're looking to blame someone).

The truth is that the adult employees-­-teachers, administrators and others--are good and bad in about the same proportions as any other professional field. And that's true school to school, as well.

The biggest predictor of any student's success is not the quality of the teachers, but the educational attainment of the student's parents, particularly his or her mother. This makes it a social and cultural issue that can't be solved by punishing educators.

Schools are trying to teach everyone, and of course all kids can learn (though not identically). But schools are in sales, and not all the students are buying.

As an educator and education researcher, I cannot see NCLB working for the kids by any means and it mires teachers in piles and piles of paperwork instead of teaching.

Whats worse is that NCLB is set up so that when the students from schools on "the wrong side of the track" with minimal resources and funding do not perform well in standardized tests, instead of offering help and resources, these schools are punished with a threat that it will be taken over by the federal government should this dismal performance continue.

I am not sure how "no child left behind" is supposed to work if you do not help the children who are left behind because they are poor and cannot go to the "right" schools. Sounds to me like NCLB is saying if you go to the "right" schools with good teachers, funding, smaller classroom size and do well, then we can pour in money so that you can become edu-robots performing to our arbitrary tests. Otherwise, sucks to be you. Too bad, so sad.

I would agreee with other posters who think NCLB is the dumbing down of students.
a few suggestions:

Studies have recently said exercize increases brain activity, yet many students only take PE-once or twice a week. Perhaps JRh & HS students could get extra time at lunch to walk the campus or use the track before beginning PM classes. I am surprised with the nationwide obesity epidemic-that PE is mostly taken once a week.
-Many schools still focus on English and sentence structure.­.My daughter, now 9th grader, had 2 classes per day of English/vocab.
With the advent of the nets and the shortening of sentences using abbrv. and acronyms-I wonder if sentence structure is really AS important to warrent twice daily classes. Would rather see extra hours put to math & science. Vocab could be self-study with brief quiz given weekly.
-Interpersonal Communicat­ion-necess­ary class.
-Journaling by students. Teachers should grade weekly-and could identify kids with abnormal/behavioral probs.
-more $$ to math & science depts.
-probability & stats taught before Geometry.a­lgebra...
-interaction with business comm.to show students types of careers available and courses of study.
-parents given choice of 2-3 schools to go to rather than 1-to make schools competitive-audits given frequently to identify those lower performing schools.
-PTSO $ go to one district bank account-rather than richer school districts having the benefit
of additional funds-$$could be rotated to schools. (higher income parents)
-Why in this day and age-are books not softcover? cheaper to make-easier for kids to carry.Book­s too heavy.If they don't hold up-laminate the covers.
-More afterschool math & science projects/c­ompetition­s
-Give students a reading list at beginning of year-pay them per book read.
There's for starters..­.

I strongly AGREE. NCLB is a 'farce'. It does nothing to increase the education level of our children. It pumps billions of dollars into 'MANDATED' local school programs with no tangible improvements.

Children are being left behind - EVERYDAY. Our public schools are failing and some have failed miserably. Parents are depending on the government too, too much in the education of their children.

The system is utterly corrupt and needs to be totally and irrevocably scrapped.

Everyone who has ever gone to school is an expert on education. Along with that comes the fact that boards of ed make the decisions that administrators put in place. If we continue to ignore the children as we have forever we will continue to use education as a political football. We actually have a very expensive, and a very able education process in spite of all the efforts to dismantle it. Children learn from many sources 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I'm sure there are great public schools; great home schooling; great private schools. Whether we test everyone or not does not make them any worse or better - because in the end the kids will be the deciding factor.

Far beyond anything bad anybody can say against NCLB, it is even WORSE than you know.

I have taught HS for over 25 years, most of that in the "impact" subject of English.

NCLB and the culture that it has created, is absolutely toxic to learning and thinking,
and kids and families and schools.

Great for politicians and Educational
product Merchant$, though.

There is no "fixing" NCLB.

It must be utterly and totally wiped away.

American elementary education is a farce because those in charge fail to understand the difference between teacher centered education and student centered education. They think they know but know not.

I have not talked to 5 educators in this country that understands the tremendous challenge and skills it takes to educate children in a student centered environment. This change will require a paradigm shift of the highest order.

I spent years studying the difference between different countries and the way they educate their children. Visit a 4th or 5th grade class at a large school and look at their faces. They are mentality asleep.

With the exception of the top 10%. Our top ten per cent do as well as anyone in the world it is the other 90% were we are in trouble.

Also we must understand the need to become a process oriented educational system and not continue to maintain our failed policy of results only oriented education (testing) if we are to have one of the best educational systems in the world.

We need someone who will defend the Constitution. We are losing it. Please watch http://zeitgeistmovie.com/

The school system is intentionally inadequate. Please watch. It's a free download.

NCLB is a typical Bush scam. And the children are the ones who will suffer for it.
As for Obama, I don't call 8 years as a state senator, 10 as a constitutional lecturer and 3 as a US senator lacking. Especially compared with Edwards -6, and Clinton - 6. Yet the pundits allow clinton to get away with the experience tag and lambast Obama for being inexperienced.
I would also say, before throwing that or other strawmen around, first check on the record of Obama in both the state and the US senate and compare it to, say, Hillary or Edwards when he was there. Then say Obama isn't ready

I so agree, Olivia. NCLB has taken the creativity and individuality away from both students and teachers. It has successfully gutted much of the real learning that was going on and is only a political ploy to disable the public education system so that it can be privatized. I took an early retirement after 21 years of teaching because of all that has been gutted in terms of good texts, reasonable class sizes, over-testing (written by non-educators,) and lack of support by the public in general. Teaching and learning used to be way more pleasurable. Now it's all about arbitrary numbers.