NCLB Study: State Support for Schools’ Improvement Varies

One of the first examinations of state practices in carrying out the federal No Child Left Behind Act’s school improvement requirements suggests that states are implementing an assortment of approaches to help schools. But the amount of money available for such activities varies widely by state and may bear little relation to the number of schools identified for improvement.

Such schools are supposed to receive help from their states—to the tune of $493 million this school year and an estimated $514 million in 2005-06.

“Some states are really stretched, and some states are rolling in money,” said Phyllis McClure, an independent education consultant who conducted the study on behalf of the Washington-based Center for American Progress, a nonpartisan research and education group. “It is not true that all states...