Education Next – Paul E. Peterson and Matthew Ackerman
“Since No Child Left Behind (NCLB) was enacted into federal law in 2002, states have been required to test students in grades 3 through 8 and again in high school to assess math and reading achievement. The federal law also asks states to establish the performance level students must reach on the exams in order to be identified as “proficient.” According to NCLB, each school was expected to increase the percentage of proficient students at a rate that would ensure that all students were proficient by the year 2014. Student proficiency rates have been publicly reported every year for schools in every state as well as for the state as a whole. Importantly, each state chooses its own tests and sets its own proficiency bar. NCLB also requires the periodic administration of tests in selected subjects to a representative sample of students in 4th and 8th grade as part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), also known as the nation’s report card, which is administered under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Education. The performance levels considered proficient on NAEP tests are roughly equivalent to those set by international organizations that estimate student proficiency worldwide.”(more)