Moving Every Child Ahead: From NCLB Hype to Meaningful Educational Opportunity by the Equity Campaign’s Michael Rebell and Jessica Wolff is being called a “rare” contribution that “advances an intellectual and legal framework for how the federal role might actually be re-shaped.” The review, written by Elizabeth DeBray-Pelot, an Associate Professor at the University of Georgia , and expert on the role of the federal government in education, appears in this month’s edition of The Education Review: A Journal of Books.

In their book, Rebell and Wolff assert that the important goals of the federal No Child Left Behind Act have been undermined by the impossible accountability measures that demand that 100% of ’s children reach required proficiency levels by 2014. They believe NCLB should be revised to require serious efforts to give all children, but particularly those of backgrounds of concentrated poverty, a meaningful educational opportunity and offer their recommendations on how to do this.  

As Brays-Pelot writes, “the strength of this work is that it looks to a vision of the federal role beyond the confines of test-based accountability – it looks beyond the traditional framework of categorical programs to a more comprehensive vision…one that would require states to provide students with both in-school and out-of-school opportunities to learn.”  

To read the full review, please visit the Education Review.

Published Monday, Sep. 29, 2008