Federal act will lead to changes in schools

School officials have begun to brace themselves for the challenge of meeting requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act.

"In my opinion, this will be the most influential piece of legislation for Alleghany County Schools in the last 50 years," said Superintendent Duane Davis.

Similarly, a joint release from the Public School Forum and the N.C. Department of Public Instruction described the act, passed in 2001, as the most sweeping change in federal education policy in three decades.

During the Alleghany County Board of Education's Feb. 5 meeting, Davis briefed board members on some aspects of NCLB, including differences between that legislation and the state's ABCs accountability program, under which all North Carolina public schools have been operating since 1997. He said next month's meeting will include a more detailed and extensive presentation.

With NCLB, Davis said, "There will be increasing pressure on them (teachers) over and above what the ABCs has done, and increasing pressure on students."

At the same time, he said he looked forward to it as a challenge. "I look at it as an exciting event....It has an opportunity to help encourage students to perform better, and that's our goal."

NCLB uses the 2001-02 school year as a benchmark and calls for incremental progress every year. Its requirements include every pupil demonstrating proficiency in mathematics by 2013-14.

Davis said the requirements of the act will change people's lives. "You're going to have more parents calling you, you're going to have more teachers concerned," he stated.

Get the rest of this article in this week's issue of the Alleghany News! Back