Education Secretary: Struggling Schools Can Be Saved

RENEE MONTAGNE, host:

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan appeared before Congress yesterday. The administration wants a complete overhaul of No Child Left Behind, the law that was supposed to raise achievement in American schools. NPR's Larry Abramson reports.

LARRY ABRAMSON: Few things can compete with health care for complexity, but this education law comes close. So Secretary Arne Duncan boiled his reform proposal down to bullet points.

Secretary ARNE DUNCAN (Department of Education): First, raising standards. Secondly, rewarding excellence in growth. And third, increasing local control and flexibility while maintaining a laser-like focus on equity and closing achievement gaps.

ABRAMSON: The proposal would focus on the nation's worst schools and provide them with federal dollars and oversight. Other schools that have felt hassled by Washington will get some relief. The issue for many lawmakers is how to fix those failing schools. It's something that has puzzled educators. The administration says these schools must replace their staffs, or undertake some other radical reform. Republican Mark Souder of Indiana wondered how those schools would survive being labeled.

Representative MARK SOUDER (Republican, Indiana): Why would anyone ever choose to teach in one of these schools if they think there's a 50 percent chance they're going to be fired? Why would a principal go there?

ABRAMSON: Part of the overhaul envisions requirements that districts assign the most effective teachers to struggling schools. Duncan seemed confident that these schools can be saved and that teachers will work in them.

Sec. DUNCAN: Around the country, you have heroic teachers and principals who desperately want to go to the toughest communities and make a difference.

ABRAMSON: Many members seem to wonder whether their districts might be facing the fate of Central Falls High School in Rhode Island, where the entire teaching staff was fired to meet federal mandates. Some lawmakers wanted to know why only a limited number of schools within many districts can take steps short of firing their staffs.

Congressman John Tierney is a Democrat from Massachusetts.

Representative JOHN TIERNEY (Democrat, Massachusetts): I just dont get the rationale and I dont see any evidence as a foundation for your decision to limit that transformation model where you haven't limited the others.

Sec. DUNCAN: Again, what we want to see is in these very low performance schools - again, these are just the bottom five percent in any state - we want to see very aggressive action taken and talent needs to be a piece of that.

ABRAMSON: Duncan alluded to the fact that under No Child Left Behind many districts have taken what some see as the easy way out to avoid firing. But he was careful not to get into arguments with lawmakers whose support he needs as work begins to rewrite this law.

Amid the lofty talk of saving kids from failing schools, Democrat Joe Courtney of Connecticut had some practical concerns.

Representative JOE COURTNEY (Democrat, Connecticut): Yeah, we have an economy, it's like a patient with a heart attack, and we're asking school districts to run a marathon right now with resources that are going to really get real scary at the end of this calendar year.

ABRAMSON: Many educators complain that No Child Left Behind created new demands but provided few resources. They are very concerned that an update of the law will repeat that experience at the worst possible moment.

Larry Abramson, NPR News, Washington. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.