Reading is Fundamental
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I need some help. I've never been much of a number person, and I've quite never understood budgets. I like words; language and the rich power of words fascinate me. But when words and numbers become mixed up, I'm really lost. So who can help me understand what is going on with the federal government's newly proposed education budget? "No Child Left Behind," announced Bush four days after the inauguration as he pushed forward his ideas for a stronger plan to increase the reading levels of the nation's children. But when this plan is examined, much of the budgeted money goes for measuring student achievement, not improving it. "Measuring is the only way to know whether all our children are learning. And I want to know, because I refuse to leave any child behind in America," Bush stated about his program. Here's where the water becomes not only cloudy but downright murky. Why does the federal budget proposed this past week cut such programs as Reading is Fundamental, and why is the federal government only appropriating $320 million for mandatory federal testing in grades three through eight when the total bill will cost states approximately $7 billion? All of the experts agree that when students actually read books, reading scores improve. Since 1968, the Reading is Fundamental program has been providing paperback books to at-risk children across the nation. Dolores S. Malcolm, director of teaching in the St. Louis Public Schools, credits this program directly for increasing student literacy. "No Child Left Behind" began in an effort to lessen the gap between disadvantaged children and their more advantaged peers. Reading is Fundamental funds one hundred percent of the programs at the state level which provides books for migrant workers and children in homeless shelters. It is these children with unpredictable and unstable school attendance who need the most help with reading. Making sure all children can read, means all children, not just those who can afford to buy their own books or those in schools with a large tax base able to purchase all the books necessary. The federal budget focuses on testing results and accountability, not on the children themselves.They want achievement results, and they have left the states to not only figure out how to pay for the results on their own, but how to implement the measuring stick for accountability. Sure, programs like Reading is Fundamental can apply for grants at the state and local levels, but according to the head of the program, William Trueheart, negotiations with book publishers are only possible with a large organization, and the national program cannot exist with seventy percent of its budget gone.
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