"The Every Student Succeeds Act" encourages educators to use school improvement strategies backed by rigorous research. This snapshot, based on national surveys administered in 2018, describes what guidance states provided on improvement strategies and how districts selected such strategies in lowest-performing schools. Most states…

The challenges facing our children in the 21st century are rapidly changing. As a result, schools bear a greater responsibility to prepare students for college, career, and life and must be held accountable for more than just testing and reporting on a narrow set of outcomes aimed at minimum levels of competency. Thus, scholars, educators, and…

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) preserves the most positive legacy of the No Child Left Behind era--more accurate and transparent data about the performance of all students--and helps states take their efforts to use data in support of student learning to the next level. The Data Quality Campaign (DQC) appreciates the opportunity to provide…

The reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) provides an opportunity to transform how data are used in education. The 2002 ESEA requirement to disaggregate data and provide them to the public has made it possible to have greater transparency and more accurate measures of academic performance than ever. Congress now has…

Implementing school choice programs and bolstering parental engagement are both frequently touted as critical steps in improving educational outcomes in US schools. Many policy makers contend that by providing parents with more schooling options for their children, parents will become more involved in their children's education, resulting in…

Education data can empower educators, students, parents, and policymakers with the information they need to make the best decisions to improve student achievement, information that can move the nation toward an education system in which every student graduates prepared for college and career. Safeguarding the privacy of student data is a critical…

Parents and communities should have access to comprehensive, easily accessible data on how schools are doing. This report zeroes in on the expected reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) as the opportunity for lawmakers to require public reporting on such crucial indicators as achievement, high schools, school…

The pending reauthorization of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, the George W. Bush administration's iteration of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, provides an important opportunity to consider what federal education policy could be in the United States. In this paper, we explain how the rationalization of education, particularly of…

In September 2011, the Obama Administration invited states to apply for waivers of key requirements of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) as amended by the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). The Administration's waiver initiative offers states the flexibility to move away from the flawed provisions of NCLB, including several…

It's no surprise that, 28 years after the publication of "A Nation at Risk," school-reform efforts have generated so little effect. The nation's schools have proven, over the past century, adept at resisting change. Recent attempts to inject accountability and innovation have brought an important opportunity. No Child Left Behind helped…

This is one in a series of policy briefs on key education issues prepared by the RAND Corporation for the Obama administration. No Child Left Behind gave students in low-performing schools the opportunity to switch schools, but only a small percentage of eligible students exercise the option. The low rate of uptake is due to operational issues and…

Never before have Americans had greater access to information about school quality. Under the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), all school districts are required to distribute annual report cards detailing student achievement levels at each of their schools. Local newspapers frequently cover the release of state test results, emphasizing…

The past decade has witnessed an unprecedented expansion of the influence of the private sector in all aspects of public education. Across the United States, test publishers, software companies, virtual charter school operators, and other industries are rapidly moving to take advantage of the significant revenues made available by public policies.…

The ever-increasing standards of No Child Left Behind regulations and various state assessments have put more pressure on teachers and administrators to monitor the learning process. Fortunately, the advent of technology is allowing teachers to test more often to prepare students for high-stakes tests and for districts to understand results for…

Effective evidence-based action requires getting the right data into the right hands at the right time to help make decisions. The Data Quality Campaign (2011) has provided suggestions to state education agencies for effectively using data within state longitudinal data systems. One suggestion is to identify "the variety of ways available…