As Congress went on recess this week, leaders pledged to eventually negotiate the differences in competing bills aimed at a long-awaited overhaul of the No Child Left Behind Act.
Rep. John Kline, a Republican from Minnesota who has led his party’s negotiations in the House, issued a statement saying he is confident a compromise can be reached “in the coming months.” He and Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash. met to discuss a conference committee that would resolve the differences in competing bills passed by both chambers in July.
Both bills would, to varying degrees, push responsibility for school accountability back to the states, undoing the centrally coordinated testing mandates of the turn-of-the-millennium No Child law. That law, passed under Pres. George W. Bush, overhauled the Elementary and Secondary Education Act that was a major piece of Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson’s “War on Poverty.” The Bush-era overhaul has been scheduled for revision since 2007.
Any compromise that rolls back testing requirements would not automatically reduce testing in Georgia, since state law reflects the current federal mandates. Major federal changes would toss the testing issue back to the states, and Georgia’s General Assembly and governor would have to debate whether to change the testing regimen.
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