State Loses NCLB Waiver Over Common Core
Oklahoma denied extension of No Child Left Behind waiver
By ANDREA EGER World Staff Writer
The U.S. Department of Education on Thursday denied Oklahoma’s request for a one-year extension of its flexibility waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
The denial means the state will revert back to all of the school accountability requirements of No Child Left Behind. That is expected to land as many as 90 percent of the state’s public schools on the Oklahoma School Improvement List within the next few months for not having enough students in grades 3-8 demonstrate proficiency in reading and math.
Gov. Mary Fallin said she was outraged and vowed “to fight it with every tool available to the state of Oklahoma.”
The penalties for schools in need of improvement under NCLB range from parent notices about student achievement gaps and restricting the use of some of schools’ federal funding, to replacing the entire faculties, converting to charter schools or even a state takeover.