Dear Congressman Payne,

With the No Child Left Behind Act coming up for reauthorization, I felt it important to bring to light some key issues surrounding the topic. First, I would like a better explanation of how losing funding is supposed to help failing schools. According to the current system, a school that does not meet the government-mandated benchmarks and does not make “adequate yearly progress” can be subject to loses in federal funding. How is this school supposed to improve with fewer resources than it had before? Certainly it does not take a mastermind to figure out that if a school is failing with what it has, giving it less to work with will probably cause things to get worse as opposed to better.

Second, I think this program will merely promote the ever-widening achievement gap present in our country today. If we continue to handicap the schools that need help and reward the schools that are functioning at a high level, then we are adding to the problem. Students who live in failing districts will be subjected to worse teaching and fewer resources while those in superior districts will watch as their list of advantages grows without bound. A proponent of No Child Left Behind may say that this problem is covered by transfer vouchers. However, this brings me to my third point.

If failing schools continue to fail due to a lack of funding and students continue to transfer to “better” districts, then at what point do these “better” districts become over-burdened? Perhaps these high-achieving districts were only successful because of their current size or demographic. Could this transfer system not pose a huge threat to our districts that are currently in compliance with No Child Left Behind standards? A large influx of students may be more than these districts are prepared to handle. It seems to me that the system is destined for failure.

While the No Child Left Behind Act has the intent of helping schools perform better, it is clear that its methods are not a means to that end. I feel that reauthorization of this act with subject our struggling school districts to further troubles and may even cause problems for those districts we have classified as “successful.” Your decision should be an easy one. Please help our children and our schools and end No Child Left Behind.

Sincerely,
David J. Scutari