In New York, for example, twice as many principals in high-minority schools reported such curricular shifts as did principals in mostly white schools. The Council for Basic Education surveyed school principals in several states in the fall of 2003 and found that principals in schools with high proportions of minorities were more likely to have reduced time for history, civics, geography, the arts, and foreign languages so that they could devote more time to math and reading. These seemingly small average changes mask a disproportionate impact on the most disadvantaged students. Since 1991, instructional time spent on social studies went from 9% to 8%, and time spent on science went from 8% to 7%. Meanwhile, time for social studies and science decreased.

For math, average weekly time went from 15% to 17%. By 2004, reading was consuming 36% of instructional time. In 1991, teachers in grades 1 to 4 spent an average of 33% of their classroom instructional time on reading. The federal governmentвЂ™s periodic national survey of teachers demonstrates the curricular shifts. For now, let us begin by documenting the goal displacement stimulated by NCLB. We will discuss the evidence with regard to these intentions later in this article. More surprisingly, it is also starkly at odds with the apparent intentions of school board members and state legislators, who are responsible for implementing the policy, and with the intentions of the public whom these leaders represent. The shift in curricular coverage is also at odds with the consensus about the goals of public education to which Americans historically have subscribed. This reorientation of instruction disproportionately affects low-income and minority children, so achievement gaps may actually widen in areas for which schools are not now being held accountable. By basing sanctions solely on math and reading scores, the law creates incentives to limit - or in some cases to eliminate entirely - time spent on other important curricular objectives. But few who debate the details of implementation have considered how this accountability system has begun to shift how we think about what schools should do. By demanding that schools report achievement for racial, ethnic, and economic subgroups, the accountability system aims to shine a light on schools that вЂњleave children behind.вЂќДЄt first glance, this approach seems reasonable. No ChildВ Left Behind (NCLB) holds all elementary schools, regardless of student characteristics, accountable for achieving proficient student scores in reading and math.

The goal of the century