Obama Pardons 10 States from "No Child Left Behind" Act

President Barack Obama frees 10 States from the No Child Left Behind Act requirements that were put into place during the George W. Bush era.

The first 10 states to receive the waivers are Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Oklahoma and Tennessee. The only state that applied for the flexibility and did not get it, New Mexico, is working with the administration to get approval, a White House official told the AP. Twenty-eight other states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico have also vowed to seek waivers from the deadline. Pennsylvania, Texas and California, however, have said they will not seek a waiver. Last year, about half of the schools in the U.S. failed to meet the requirements of the act, which increases performance minimums each year.

Obama's waivers will remove that target for states that have plans to "prepare children for college and careers, set new targets for improving achievement among all students, develop meaningful teacher and principal evaluation systems, reward the best performing schools and focus help on the ones doing the worst," in the words of the AP. 


The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act supports standard based education reform, which is based on the premise that setting high standards and establishing measurable goals can improve individual outcomes in education. The Act requires states to develop assessments in basic skills to be given to all students in certain grades, if those states are to receive federal funding for schools, however does not assert a national achievement standard; standards are set by each individual state. 

In September, Obama called President George W Bush's most hyped domestic accomplishment an admirable but flawed effort that hurt students instead of helping them. He said action was necessary because Congress failed to update the law despite widespread bipartisan agreement that it needs fixing. Republicans have charged that by granting waivers, Obama was overreaching his authority. 

In states granted a waiver, students will still be tested annually. But starting this fall, schools in those states will no longer face the same prescriptive actions spelled out under No Child Left Behind. A school's performance will also probably be labeled differently. 



By pardoning states of the NCLB Act, hopefully students will be able to learn as students, rather than statistics taught how to take tests. 

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No Child Left Behind: A Decade of Failure

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sourced by Emily Sutherlin