Crash Course in NCLB

(Once you've brushed up on the lingo, read about how District 68 did here.)

No Child Left Behind is incredibly complex. Articles about AYP (adequate yearly progress) are full of jargon and acronyms.

Here’s a crash course so you can better understand what it means when a school or district does or doesn’t make AYP and why that was.

(Disclaimer: I am not an expert on NCLB. I’m just a journalist who has had to learn enough about it to explain it to others.)

NCLB: Complex legislation meant to add accountability to American education.

Goal: All children meet state standards in math and reading by 2014.

How it works:

Each year school and school districts are judged as to whether they made “adequate yearly progress.” Obviously, 100 percent of student are not meeting state standards, and NCLB wants schools to show an increase in the number of students who are each year.

To get a fair reading of a district, most, if not all, of its students need to take a standardized test.

Ninety-five percent of students in third through sixth grades must take the ISAT, Illinois’ standardized test. Illinois decides how well a student has to do on the test to “meet state standards.”

States also decide what constitutes “adequate yearly progress.” Illinois has come up with a graduated percentage scale. In 2009, 70 percent of students had to meet state standards. In 2010, 77.5 did. In 2011, 86 percent do and in 2012 92.5 percent do.

Where it gets tricky:

Schools and districts aren’t judged just on the student population overall. There are also 10 student subgroups. These subjects include white, black, Hispanic, multiracial, Asian, Native American, Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, economically disadvantaged, students with disabilities and limited English proficiency.

If a school has 45 students in grades third through sixth that fall into one of these categories, it becomes a subgroup counted toward AYP. Students can count in multiple subgroups.

This year, if 86 percent of the students in the white subgroup didn’t meet state standards, that subgroup did not meet AYP. Same with the rest.

If the number drops before 45, that subgroup no longer counts toward AYP. So what impacts AYP can change from year to year with enrollment.

Safe harbor:

This part becomes very technical, but just know that certain subgroups which have not made AYP before can have a lower target the next year than the rest of the groups.

For instance, this year, you needed 86 percent of students to meet state standards to make AYP. However, the safe harbor target for limited English proficiency in District 68 was 69.8 percent.

The future?

NCLB has faced plenty of push-back since it was signed into law in 2002. It was due for reauthorization in 2007, but hasn't been. Districts are waiting for Congress to agree on what the future of NCLB will look like or if it will be scrapped.