Congressman Sander Levin

Improving and Supporting Schools

The $100 billion reinvestment in our schools provided through the American Recovery and Investment Act, signed into law in February 2009, provides a short-term band-aid to bleak school budget forecasts, but it is clear fundamental changes are necessary. We must find a way to help school districts cope with the culmination of a worsening economy, increased costs, and historical underfunding.

I support efforts by the Obama Administration to not only make funding a priority, but to reexamine the way we fund, measure, and reward schools. We must find better ways to reward teacher excellence and innovation, expand access to technology in the classroom, and enhance curriculums to better prepare students for the demands of a globally competitive economy.

Since 2002, schools have been operating under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), which requires all schools to have 100 percent of their students performing at the proficient level on standardized tests by the end of the 2013-14 school year. In the years following NCLB’s enactment, it has become increasingly clear the current structure is not working: expensive mandates burdened local and state budgets; the absence of nation-wide standards lead to data that is inconsistent and incomparable from state to state; and issues such as the testing of new and non-English speaking students were not adequately addressed.

I believe that within the basic structure of standards set by NCLB, we must seek modifications that increase flexibility while maintaining high expectations for our students and teachers. One promising testing model receiving close attention is the “growth model,” which measures an individual student’s progress over time as opposed to the current model of measuring yearly performance against a state standard. It is also necessary to establish uniform standards to measure schools in all states. While other states reduced their benchmarks to artificially inflate their yearly testing statistics, Michigan remained committed to its students by passing the toughest high school graduation requirements in the country and deserves to be rewarded.

For more information on what Michigan is doing, visit the Michigan Department of Education’s website. For more information on what’s happening in Congress, visit the House Education & Labor Committee’s website.

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(Updated June 20, 2009)