NCLB Drives Teachers out of the Profession
A recent survey states: “Survey Reveals that Only 1% of Teachers Find No Child Left Behind an Effective Way to Assess the Quality of Schools and 69% Report It’s Pushing Teachers Out of the Profession.”
A press release reported: “April 2007—Over 5600 public school teachers from all 50 states recently responded to a Teachers Network online survey regarding the effectiveness of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) and its impact on the teaching and schools.
“Survey results show how for the majority of teachers the emphasis of NCLB on high-stakes testing is not working. Only 37 percent of respondents found standardized tests “some- what useful” but 42 percent deemed them “not at all” helpful to their teaching. Over 40 percent claim that these tests are encouraging them to use rote drill, and 44 percent report that the tests are pushing them to eliminate curriculum material not tested.
“Over 40 percent believe that NCLB does not result in teachers making instructional decisions that are best for their students or that it’s helping to reduce the achievement gap in education — its primary goal. And fewer (3 percent) agree that it encourages them to improve their teaching effectiveness with all students. Fewer still (1 percent) find it is an effective way to assess the quality of schools
“Three-quarters of the teachers surveyed reported experiencing a great deal of pressure from NCLB to improve students’ test scores due to NCLB, coming from the top down. Among the forces exerting pressure on teachers to improve student scores are state departments of education (60 percent), district administrators (57 percent), newspapers and other media (43 percent), and principals (39 percent). Only 10 percent said they felt pressure from parents.
“What will be of real concern to policymakers will be our findings regarding teacher retention: 69 percent of survey respondents “strongly agree” that NCLB with its Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) goals has contributed to teacher burnout.
“The respondents were evenly distributed across the grade levels from kindergarten through 12th grade. Slightly more than half of the survey takers (52.2 percent) were not from a school that has been identified as one in need of improvement in any academic area and/or with any disaggregated population of students.
“Teacher respondents ranged from 1-3 years experience (17.2 percent) to teachers with 25 or more years (16.5 percent). One-fifth of the teachers who responded have been teaching between 6-10 years.
“‘As we look at this data,’ explains Professor Frances Rust of the New York University Steinhardt School of Education, ‘it seems very clear that from the teachers’ perspective, NCLB is a top down mandate about which they feel greatest pressure for their students to pass high-stakes tests coming from their district administrators. This deprofessionalizes [sic] the teaching force, pushing teachers towards rote instruction that bypasses curriculum areas that are not tested and minimizes teachers’ efforts to be responsive to the specific needs of learners in their classrooms.’”
The survey and survey data are available at (http://www.teachersnetwork.org/).
