The Rise of the Fourth Reich - ThereAreNoSunglasses

312 THE RISE OF THE FOURTH REICHAlan Mathios, a dean at the College of Human Ecology at Cornell University.BU T T H E EDUCAT ION issue that has drawn the greatest recent controversyis Public Law 107-110, better known as the No Child Left BehindAct of 2001 (NCLB), a prized legacy of the Bush administration. Accordingto the act, its purpose is “to ensure that all children have a fair, equal,and significant opportunity to obtain a high- quality education and reach,at a minimum, proficiency on challenging state academic achievementstandards and state academic assessments.”Signed into law by President George W. Bush on January 8, 2002, theact nevertheless brought immediate criticism from educators, state authorities,and libertarians alike. They questioned the act’s sweeping proposals,which range from forcing teachers to conform to federally mandated curriculato inflicting monetary punishments on school districts that donot live up to federal expectation, and even taking state control or turningthem over to private management companies. They also questioned the$410 million apportioned for the education of migratory children, most ofwhom come from the families of illegal aliens. Standardized testing hasproven a handicap to children who speak En glish as a second language.While no caring person would want to be caught leaving some poorchild “behind,” there was nevertheless the irksome feeling by many thatthe act was a thinly disguised attempt to force conformity on studentsand standardize the minds of American youth. It smacks of the same uniformityof education sought by the National Socialists under Hitler. Someconservatives and libertarians even claim that the act is an usurpation ofstate authority by the federal government. In 2007, the new Congress begantaking steps to protect states from the controls and punishments ofNCLB. For example, in 2005, when Utah passed a state law allowingschool districts to ignore portions of NCLB, the Department of Educationthreatened to withhold federal education funds.The backbone of NCLB is federally mandated standardized testing,which long has been accused of cultural bias. In fact, the entire practice oftesting as a determinant of educational quality has been called into ques-