Effects on No Child Left Behind Act of Special Education Regarding Standardized Testing

Abstract

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) has been the cause of much controversy sinct its enactment by President bush in 2001. NCLB requires schools to be held accountable for all their students to meet the state standards for their grade level. The controversy over NCLB lies in the fact that all students, regardless of their race, ethnicity, socio-economic background, native language, or disabilities are assessed on whether or not they have learned the state standards through one standardized test. In this article, the author will discuss how NCLB has affected special education positively by offically raising expectations fot all students and negatively by providing little flexibility for alternate assessment, often resulting in inaccurate measures of special educatin students' progress. The author will then present a solution to the single-test strategy that would include providing alternate exams and alternative forms of assessment based on the individual student's needs as reported in the student's IEP.