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* More than half of Illinois schools now “failing” under No Child Left Behind

This year, Illinois schools had to get all 77.5 percent of students—and subgroups of students, such as low-income or Latino students—to meet state standards. The Obama Administration wants to re-write the law so that schools would be measured on growth.

* Ill. schools fall further behind federal standards

* Report: Illinois Schools Falling Short

* Schools fail to push students on state tests

* School officials look for alternatives to No Child Left Behind as most Illinois schools fail

* Unemployment in Illinois metro areas fell in September

The metro areas with the largest declines in unemployment include Peoria, Decatur and Metro East.

* Jobless rate in Peoria continues to improve

The unemployment rate in the five-county Peoria metropolitan statistical area was 9.4 percent in September, down from 11.3 percent in September 2009 and from the 10 percent figure recorded in August 2010, the state reported.

* Chicago’s jobless rate fell in September

The jobless rate was 9.4 percent for the Chicago-Joliet-Naperville area, compared to 10.4 percent a year ago, the agency reported Thursday.

* Chicago foreclosure activity up 35% in third quarter

* Fitch downgrades Chicago bonds

The New York-based firm on Thursday lowered its rating on $7 billion in outstanding general-obligation city debt to AA- from AA, particularly citing the city’s increasing reliance on one-time revenues to fix its budget. […]

Fitch applauded layoffs and other payroll trims implemented by outgoing Mayor Richard M. Daley, but added, “The ability to make further expenditure cuts to personnel is extremely limited” due to union contracts.

* Minimum age for Chicago cops raised to 25, exam set for Dec. 11

* Register-Mail: Yes to sales tax; hold school boards accountable

* Davlin owes IRS $90,000; liens placed on mayor’s home

posted by Rich Miller
Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 9:39 am

Comments

By 2014, 99% of the schools (if not all) will fail NCLB because it requires that 100% of students make the AYP target.

Comment by Pot calling kettle Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 9:41 am
Ever notice that when we notice our schools are failing their are calls to rewrite the standards….

perhaps we need to just fix the school systems which tend to be massively underfunded in many areas… too many students, not enough teachers or resoruces….

Comment by Ghost Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 9:47 am
Not to worry..the new crop of elected tea party officials will eliminate federal funding for everything. Schools won’t need to strive to make their goals without that little carrot.

Comment by Highland, IL Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 10:16 am
What a lot of people do not understand about NCLB is that it is a blanket solution to situations that are drastically different. There are no considerations for special needs children. If your district has a high percentage of slow learners you get no break. They are tested and expected to perform at their grade level EQUAL TO regular-ed kids. If they don’t your school does not meet the standards. Since not all districts can afford to have programs for special needs kids, you will have districts who can’t afford these programs sending their kids to neighboring districts that do have the programs. The end result is that the poorer district might meet the standards since they have divested themselves of their special needs kids and the district that accepted them will not meet the standards because they have a higher percentage of special needs kids at their schools. The end result is the district that is trying to do the right thing by helping all students is penalized for that effort.
Some folks also contend that schools high in low income families will also have a hard time meeting the standards. The thought being that low income families somehow don’t have the ability to help their kids achieve. I have seen schools that were more than 50% low income exceed the achievements of high income schools in the same district. A lot of it has to do with parental/guardian involvement. However that is not always the case. Many areas have a history of low education achievement. Parents/guardians might not have gotten a proper education and are ill equipped to help their kids. In these areas the children fail and the poor education of the area perpetuates itself. These areas are also the schools that get the least funding since most funding in Illinois is based on property taxes.
But not all the fault lies with the NCLB. I have also seen districts that should be doing better use the disparities in the NCLB law as an excuse for poor curriculum and teaching. They complain that NCLB expectations are unreasonable citing the above excuses yet the kids that are failing are in the groups that should not be affected by the above situations.
If NCLB is kept it should be tweaked to better address special circumstances and enforced where there are no excuses.

Comment by Irish Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 10:22 am
- Highland, IL - Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 10:16 am:

“Not to worry..the new crop of elected tea party officials will eliminate federal funding for everything. Schools won’t need to strive to make their goals without that little carrot.”

This is a bad thing?

Comment by Cincinnatus Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 10:26 am
Randy Tinder, who was then superintendent of Cook County District 91, said the point of NCLB is to eventually label all public schools as failing. This will serve to build the political will to shift money from public education to private schools/education and charter schools.

Comment by Carl Nyberg Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 10:42 am
Cincy - “This is a bad thing?”

Only if you don’t want to pay more to fund the federal programs at the local and state level.

Comment by Irish Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 10:47 am
No Child Left Behind has been an ill-conceived program from the beginning. It needs to be scrapped and a whole new way of looking at quality implemented.

Comment by Aldyth Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 10:52 am
No Child Left Behind should be repealed because it violates the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Congress should eliminate all federal education spending, saving about $150 billion, per year. Since the federal government would need less money, they would cut all federal income tax rates. When that happens, each state government and school board would change their tax rates, to ensure that they can provide for education, of their kids.

Comment by Conservative Veteran Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 11:10 am
Irish,

When a school sends a student to an alternative school that can better meet the educational needs of that student, not only does the sending school need to pay tuition to the receiving school, that student’s scores on mandated tests still count towards the sending school’s AYP.

Comment by richten Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 11:12 am
- Cincinnatus - Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 10:26 am:
“This is a bad thing?”

I suspect my property taxes may rise a tad bit…

Comment by Highland, IL Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 11:14 am
Ever notice the name Barton Lorimor fits well into song…. such as “what would Barton Lorimor do…” perhaps with a south park’esqueish feel…..

Comment by Ghost Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 12:53 pm
When parents don’t think school is important, the kids don’t as well. How is giving more money to schools going to fix that?

Comment by Anonymous Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 1:15 pm
Well you start with an unsupportable premise… i.e. your assumption that kids only think school is important if their parents do is a falacious argument.

Lets try it this way. Why do some kids get low class size, new books and extracricular activites just because they have wealthy parents? And why are all our Jobs going to countries like Inida which invest heavily in educating their population?

More money will help reduce class size, whic is a big factor in how well children learn; provide new books, also a factor; provide approrpiate technology; provide for extracrulicular programs which develop socialization skills and help foucs chicldren on positive development.

Looks at the graduation rates between highly funded and underfunded schools…. thats not parents caring, thats dollars at work. Otheriwse those schools with the high graduation and success rates would cut their budgets way back.

Comment by Ghost Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 3:03 pm
The whole point of NCLB was to set a MINIMUM (not ideal) standard that every child should be able to achieve.

Annual growth is nice, but it can still graduate kids who can’t read, write, or do basic math.

Comment by Anonymous Friday, Oct 29, 10 @ 5:29 pm