100% in 2014.

With the changes in the Executive Branch, NCLB will change, but how?  The Eduguru is continuing a series of blogs on the problems opponents have had with NCLB and what they might or should do about them now.

The third is an easy one:  100% in 2014.

No one believed this goal would be reached, but it did set a long-term target that influenced annual objectives.  Besides, how do you argue against wanting every student to succeed?  Which ones are we willing to leave behind?

Look for Congress, the states, or the Education Secretary to make these changes.

1. Proficiency will be defined more normatively—across states—possibly demanding an alignment with NAEP.  This is not as difficult to pass as you might expect considering that many of the states that have the lowest standards for proficiency and the lowest NAEP scores voted Republican.

2. Growth will become the new controlling factor.  The indication that standards are falling would be that growth is no longer defined as being on pace for proficiency by the end of n years.  If any measurable, reliable growth becomes acceptable, then the barn door will be opened.

3. An IEP for special education or English language learners may trump test scores as the measure of growth.

4. Full academic year will be replaced by a longer term to reduce the number of low performers in the mix and to allow for them to recover using growth.  Look for a two-year term to be used to determine which students are included in AYP.

5. The Education Secretary may adopt a national standard for small subgroups to level that issue.  Look for the subgroup size to be 30 or above, or to be based upon confidence intervals that might require even larger groups.  (This is for AYP, not for reporting descriptive statistics for annual public report cards.)

6. Will subgroups survive as a disaggregation criterion?  Look for alternatives such as majority/minority.  Keep in mind that the new President fits into multiple race categories.  Maybe race goes away and is replaced by income.  Now that would be consistent with campaign talk.

7. Reporting 100%?  Congress may want to clean up the FERPA conundrum of not allowing reporting of 100% categories, unless new guidance is deemed sufficient.

8. Requiring 100%?  Very difficult to keep.  Very difficult to abandon.  100% can be kept as a distant target (some states already do this)—one that continues to move out into the distance as we approach it.  Like a mirage that disappears when you approach and reappears farther down the road.  Look for a 5 to 10 year horizon for 100% instead of a specific year—if 100% survives at all.

The Eduguru speaks:  I’m 100% certain there will be multiple changes, the combined impact of which will not be known for years.  Unless…Congress could authorize some impact studies for rule changes—after all, the states have longitudinal data now with which to test the proposed changes.