The Art of Self-Indulgence

Bear with me here... I'm going to indulge in a serious frustration release right now.

When is somebody going to throw out No Child Left Behind?? It's the biggest piece of crap legislation regarding education I've seen in my lifetime. SERIOUSLY. We need teachers in Congress, providing educated opinions regarding education legislation because our political leaders are NOT doing their homework (hah, hah, no pun intended). Whoever came up with the idea of scripted reading lessons was a complete idiot and knows absolutely nothing about how kids learn.

Did Bush really think a piece of legislation which provides additional funding to schools that meet AYP would get money to suffering urban schools?? Standardized testing does not measure a child's knowledge, and taking funding away from schools that aren't meeting the required minimum scores is NOT solving the problem. Clearly money should be going to the schools that are not getting the scores they need so they can hire better qualified teachers and utilize new programs to help their students. Giving money to the rich and taking it away from the poor is widening the achievement gap, and education is becoming too political.

Forcing teachers to read from a script at a specific speed for every reading lesson is the most IDIOTIC thing I have ever heard. It's as if the government is saying teachers wasted their time in college, because they allow some random publisher to tell teachers how they should teach. Education is INDIVIDUAL. You are setting the children up for failure if you expect them to all learn exactly the same way and at the same speed! This upsets me so much I feel like my passion is going to explode through my skin- the wonder and excitement of learning are being ripped from the hands of our younger generations!

It angers me so much I almost want to go into politics to enlighten some of these unfortunate individuals who make decisions that shape our country.