I’m calling congress today and tomorrow and reading this script plus the information where I give my name, city, district and phone number. If you value education or if you have children, I ask you to do the same. This script is mainly my own with a couple of phrases taken from a script that our teacher’s association wrote. I think mine is more powerful because it explains the logic as to why the proposal will hurt kids and why it is unscientific and ridiculous. You are more than welcome to use my script if you like, although it is written from a teacher’s perspective.

***

I’m asking you to vote NO on the current proposal by Representative George Miller and Speaker Nancy Pelosi to reauthorize the No Child Left Behind Act. I, along with other teachers support accountability, but only the accountability on factors we can control entirely. This reauthorization proposal makes a bad law even worse. Its one-size-fits-all approach is hurting students because it is based on the premise that children are robots not human beings. There are multiple factors that influence learning—yes, the teachers, but also students’ own natural intelligences, their emotional well beings, their family life and culture, their resources at home, their ability to do well under pressure, and their own social network at school. To expect all children to be proficient in all subject levels based solely on what is happening in their classroom is unrealistic and not even grounded on basic scientific fact—there is a natural bell curve that happens in societies in all areas, including intelligence and skills. How can a law affecting education, which teaches science, be based on such an unscientific belief? It is hypocritical and ridiculous. All this bill will do is hurt children because it does not work to solve the entire problem and also by making it harder to attract quality teachers into our public schools, thus further hurting our children. I expect that very few people would want to get into a profession in which test scores are the be-all-end-all determination of their livelihood. Teacher pay is already low enough. In the end, No Child Left Behind sounds wonderful, but it is a seriously flawed Act that doesn’t take into account the multiple influences that interconnect and play a vital role in the dynamics of learning.  Please support classroom teachers and the students they teach and vote No on the Miller-Pelosi NCLB Reauthorization proposal. Something needs to be done about our children, but this is not the answer.  If you have any questions or need further information, please call me at ………