Every Student Succeeds Act

signs the Act into law, December 2015. The bill is the first to narrow the United States federal government's role in elementary and secondary education since the 1980s. The ESSA retains the hallmark annual standardized testing requirements of the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act but shifts the law's federal accountability provisions to states. Under the law, students will continue to take annual tests between the third and eighth grades. In doing so, the Department of Education still holds states accountable by ensuring they are implementing complete and ambitious, yet feasible goals. Students will then be tested each year from third through eighth grade and then once again their junior year of high school. These standardized tests will determine each student's capabilities in the classroom, and the success of the state in implementing its plans. The states are also left to determine the consequences low-performing schools might face and how they will be supported in the following years. All states must have a multiple-measure accountability system, which include the following four indicators: achievement and/or growth on annual reading/language arts and math assessments; English language proficiency, an elementary and middle school academic measure of student growth; and high school graduation rates. All states also had to include at least one additional indicator of school quality or student success, commonly called the fifth indicator. Most states use chronic absenteeism as their fifth indicator. Another primary goal of the ESSA is preparing all students, regardless of race, income, disability, ethnicity, or proficiency in English, for a successful college experience and fulfilling career. Therefore, the ESSA also requires schools to offer college and career counseling and advanced placement courses to all students. == History ==

The No Child Left Behind Act was due for reauthorization in 2007, but was not pursued for a lack of bipartisan cooperation. Many states failed to meet the NCLB's standards, and the Obama administration granted waivers to many states for schools that showed success but failed under the NCLB standards. However, these waivers usually required schools to adopt academic standards such as the Common Core. Following his 2014 re-election, Senate HELP Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-TN), who had served as Education Secretary under President George H. W. Bush, decided to pursue a major rewrite of No Child Left Behind. == Students with disabilities ==

The ESSA also sets new mandates on expectations and requirements for students with disabilities. Most students with disabilities will be required to take the same assessments and will be held to the same standards as other students. The ESSA allows for only one percent of students, accounting for ten percent of students with disabilities, to be excused from the usual standardized testing. This one percent is reserved for students with severe cognitive disabilities, who will be required to take an alternate assessment instead. This is a smaller percentage of students than under past mandates, mainly because there is not enough staff available to administer the assessments to the students one-on-one. The Department of Education does not define disabled, rather, each state decides its own definition in order to determine which students will be allowed to take the alternate assessment. This could prove to be more challenging, though, when it comes to comparing students to one another because not all states will define disabled the same way. The ESSA has also recognized that bullying and harassment in schools disproportionately affects students with disabilities. Because of this, the ESSA requires states to develop and implement plans on how they will combat and attempt to reduce bullying incidents on their campuses. ==Reception and opinion==

Journalist Libby Nelson wrote that the ESSA was a victory for conservatives who wished to see federal control of school accountability transferred to states, and that states "could scale back their efforts to improve schools for poor and minority children". However, they also expressed concern that, in an effort to set proficiency levels that low-performing students could pass, states would neglect the needs of high-performing students, which would disproportionately affect high-performing, low-income students. Criticism While the ESSA has received positive responses, it has also faced major critiques for various reasons. People argue that ESSA's focus on state-level control and accountability has resulted in inconsistencies in the quality of education, which ultimately emphasizes pre-existing inequities that existed under the policies that were replaced by the ESSA, which are the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and the No Child Left Behind Act. Other concerns that were raised were a shift in control which can result in further inconsistencies when it comes to enforcement which would possibly worsen current inequalities in regards to resource allocation for students who face various disadvantages. The major shift from requiring qualified teachers to only guaranteeing equitable distribution of out-of-field teachers has played a role in poor academic performance and an increase in teacher turnover rates. Critics call for a more integrated method of approach to leadership and funding to reach the full potential of the ESSA to improve educational outcomes. By mandating complete needs evaluations and supporting interest groups involvement, the ESSA has made sure that improvement plans are constructed to fit the needs of the disadvantaged students and those from minority groups. This method strengthens equity in education and state's flexibility, leaving a national impact on the educational field. ==State testing under ESSA==

According to the October 24, 2015 U.S. Department of Education Fact Sheet: Testing Action Plan, state testing programs implemented under the No Child Left Behind Act and Race to the Top were "draining creative approaches from our classrooms", "consuming too much instructional time" and "creating undue stress for educators and students." Federal mandates and incentives were cited as partly responsible for students spending too much time taking standardized tests. Neither the statute nor the regulations apply any specific limits on test design, As of 2018-19, some states like Maryland continue to fulfill ESSA assessment requirements by administering four or more content-specific state standardized tests with testing windows that stretch from December through June. The ESSA prohibits any officer or employee of the Federal Government from using grants, contracts or other cooperative agreements to mandate, direct or control a state's academic standards and assessments. It also explicitly prohibited any requirement, direction or mandate to adopt the Common Core State Standards and gave states explicit permission to withdraw from the Common Core State Standards or otherwise revise their standards. On January 31, 2019, Florida's Governor signed an executive order "eliminating Common Core and the vestiges of Common Core" from Florida's public schools. A possibly out-of-date or incomplete enumeration of state testing initiatives designed to satisfy the requirements of the ESSA can be found at List of state achievement tests in the United States. • California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CASPP), replaced California Standardized Testing and Reporting Program (STAR) in 2013. • Connecticut Mastery Test (CMT) • Hawaii Smarter Balanced Assessment (SBA). The SBA is a test set developed by the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium of US states. • Maryland Comprehensive Assessment Program (MCAP) • Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) • Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) == Suspension of accountability requirements ==

An inauguration day directive on January 20, 2017, from President Donald Trump's Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff "Regulatory Freeze Pending Review" delayed implementation of new regulations, including portions of the ESSA. On February 10, 2017, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos wrote to chief state school officers that "states should continue their work" in developing their ESSA plans and noted that a revised template may be issued. In March 2017, Republican lawmakers with the support of the Trump administration used the Congressional Review Act to eliminate the Obama administration's accountability regulations. ==See also==