No Child Left Behind Act: Improvements Needed in Education's Process for Tracking States' Implementation of Key Provisions;Report to the Congress

摘要

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLBA) has focused national attention on improving the academic achievement of the nation's 48 million students by establishing a deadline--school year 2013-14--for public schools to ensure that all students are proficient in reading and math. Accordingly, states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico developed plans that set goals for increasing the numbers of students who attain proficiency on state tests each year, with all meeting goals by 2014. To provide information about states efforts, GAO determined (1) what goals states established for student proficiency and their implications for whether schools will meet these goals$ (2) what factors facilitated or impeded selected state and school district implementation efforts$ and (3) how the Department of Education (Education) supported state efforts and approved state plans to meet student proficiency requirements.