No Child Left Behind: the Politics and Practice of School Accountability

School Administrator, Sept, 2004 by William G. Keane

American schools have been pressured to demonstrate accountability since at least the mid-1970s. What began as state-level campaigns to produce academic improvements on minimum competency tests of basic skills and install course graduation requirements has morphed into a federal initiative built on mandated testing and sanctions on teachers, schools and districts.

In light of this 30-year national obsession with testing, this book attempts to determine through quality research what externally imposed, top-down accountability strategies have produced after all these years. Sadly, the answer is precious little.

No Child Left Behind: The Politics and Practice of School Accountability consists of 13 essays about the history and practice of efforts to improve schools largely by imposing sanctions on schools and teachers that are not successful in raising student learning. The public school educator may approach this volume with suspicion that the contents may be more screed than objective research. One of the editors (Paul E. Peterson) and several of the authors (Tom Loveless, Eric Hanuschek, Terry Moe) are widely identified as critics of some popular components of public education.

Not to worry. The research in this book is sophisticated and objective. Several authors admit there is little evidence that a system of sanctions on schools produces better education. Most studies are barely able to decipher correlations, let alone causation. Many authors admit that the concerns of testing critics are true--dropout rates for minorities go up and the benefits of coerced summer school disappear after one or two years.

The book looks at accountability politics and charter school achievement. Two chapters draw different conclusions about the effectiveness of Chicago's high-stakes testing program while an examination of the accountability movement in California finds promise and a significant pitfall (a widening of the gap in teacher qualifications between low- and high-achieving schools). A final chapter investigates international evidence of the effectiveness of exit exams on student achievement.

(No Child Left Behind: The Politics and Practice of School Accountability edited by Paul E. Peterson and Martin R. West, Brookings Institution Press, Washington, D.C., 2003, 323 pp., $52.95 hardcover, $22.95 softcover)