WASHINGTON — School kids would still take annual standardized tests, but states would have much more control in how the results are used to scrutinize schools under a bipartisan plan to update the No Child Left Behind education law announced Tuesday by two key senators.
“We have found remarkable consensus about the urgent need to fix this broken law, and also on how to fix it. We look forward to a thorough discussion and debate in the Senate education committee next week,” said Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., the chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, in a joint press release issued with Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., the committee’s senior Democrat.
Murray said there’s more work to be done, but the agreement is a “strong step in the right direction.”
The White House, in a statement, called the agreement an “important step in their bipartisan effort.”
The Senate agreement comes in contrast to a partisan stalemate in the House, where a vote on a GOP-crafted bill to update the Bush-era law was abruptly cancelled in February amid opposition from conservatives concerned that it would continue too strong a federal role in education. House Democrats all along widely opposed the bill, authored by Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., and said it abdicated the federal role in protecting minority, poor and disabled children. The White House threatened to veto it.