Failing schools underreported

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Many states and local school districts are underreporting the number of schools failing to teach children to read and do mathematics at their grade level as required by the 2-year-old No Child Left Behind Act, fearful of ultimately losing control over poorly performing schools.

Education Secretary Rod Paige says the problem of districts and states "playing games" to avoid accountability for poor teaching and learning in their schools is not yet "under control" and is anticipated with "any big change like this."

"In fact, there's a level of expectation that there will be those that will push the envelope and try to game the system," Mr. Paige said in an interview with The Washington Times, two years after President Bush's education-reform law took effect.

So far, more than half the states have reported a combined 2,513 fewer low-performing schools than they did last year, according to data from initial state reports issued Friday by Education Week. Some states did report a rise in the number of low-performing schools over last year, and some have yet to report.

"The idea is not to be on any list that a school needs improvement," said Rob Weil, director of education issues for the American Federation of Teachers, the nation's second-largest teachers union.

But Mr. Weil said because standards are stiffening, the number of low-performing schools should be going up, not down, in the second year of the 12-year duration of the law.

"The number of schools on the list will go up significantly because, under the law, the bar schools have to reach now will go up," Mr. Weil said. "So the schools that were on the margin will have to reach that bar, or they will be added to the list."

States thus far have listed 5,200 schools as low-performing, from among the 91,380 public elementary and secondary schools nationally -- 40 percent fewer than the department's 2002 listing of 8,652 schools needing improvement.