Although No Child Left Behind has turned into something of a fiasco-lowering academic standards, teaching to the test, restricting efforts to a circumscribed curriculum, and trying to evaluate teachers according to tested outcomes of students only, the impulse for putting it into place was essentially right. (Remember, President Bush's "big ticket item" when he entered office was educational reform and improvement. Sadly, he got waylaid on this.) Unfortunately, the theory on which it is based is flawed, because all children given the same teaching input are not equally capable, interested or (dis)advantaged. Nor are their parents, who must set the stage at home for academic success. You've got to want it.

It's all been dropped on the teachers to promote, even achieve, academic success with their students. Teachers are left "holding the bag" of being responsible for student achievement. But too often, teachers, even when they are capable, "cut their students a break" by giving extra credit for make-work projects when the students classroom performance is subpar, curve test grades upward when the majority of students door poorly (why do some almost always do well regardless?), and accept late school work as on-time (especially when it's late because of extracurricular activities done in its place).

Both parents and school administrators often are more interested in their students' social success and demonstrated athletic prowess than whether the students will leave high school adequately educated either to enter college or face the work world head on.

This is not an exhaustive summary of what's wrong with secondary education in the United States, but it hits the low points.

This does not touch on what might be needed at the elementary and mid-school levels, which is something apart. (I happen to think that elementary and mid-school education in Hays is above par. High school is "par for the course".)

What will be the outcome if this continues? Our children won't be able to compete in the global economy. Make no mistake about it, ACT scores in the 21 range do not demonstrate that our students are doing well academically in high school. The ACT, unlike the SAT, which is an I.Q. test in part, is an achievement test. The score on the ACT tells how much of what a student should have (could have) learned in high school he or she actually learned. Learning, at best, 60 percent of the material offered is not a coup. Where I came from in the ancient past that was a D grade. In the world of developed and developing nations, it still is. So where are we going in this modern world? You guess?

No, I am not an academic elitist, as my friend Don Desbien would seem to think. (And Don, no one more than a farmer needs a good basic education coming out of high school.) In fact, I am the ultimate academic egalitarian. I believe in equal educational opportunity and commensurate individual student performance, and if I had the power to assure compliance with honest standards, I'd make sure no one in high school Just gets by, as so many are doing now. Something for real must be done to upgrade public school academic education in this country. No Child Left Behind has not. We will lose "big time" as a nation if this doesn't come about. (No, you can't make it all up in college. Ask the remedial English and math teachers at FHSU.) We, as individual American citizens and workers must be able to compete successfully in the world at large, not just at home in a less and less protected intellectual and work environment.

If we continue to carry on in like manner, we won't be carrying on very well that long into the future at all. Are we now? Could this be part of the reason why?

Gary J. Whitesell

213 W. 21st