He claims to want "no child left behind." But President Bush is touting a school "reform" plan that would leave more children than ever in schools that don't provide the high-quality education that all children deserve.

Bush's plan is based on a number of bad ideas. Conspicuous among them are his embrace of school vouchers and his insistence that schools should be forced to give even more standardized tests.

Rethinking Schools offers:

• Houston's "Zero Dropout" Miracle
  By Michael Winerip. Texas schools are under pressure to calculate their dropout numbers Enron-style. New York Times education columnist Michael Winerip takes a closer look.
• NCLB: Don't Mourn, Organize
  By Monty Neill. No Child Left Behind is leaving a sour taste in the mouths of many. However, there are ways to make lemonade from NCLB lemons.
• Three articles by Rethinking Schools editor Stan Karp: one which looks at the fallacies of the new Elementary and Secondary Education Act, one which dissects Bush's "No Child Left Behind" plan point-by point, and one which shines a light on the dubious team of education advisors Bush has collected.
• E.S.E.A. Watch (Vol 17 Issue 3)
  By Stan Karp Equity. Claims for NCLB don't pass the test.
• E.S.E.A. Watch (Vol 17 Issue 2)
  By Bob Peterson. Testing reigns in Britain - but resistance is growing.
• E.S.E.A. Watch (Vol. 17 Issue 1)
  By Bob Peterson. The federal education law is leaving English-language learners behind.
• A critique of Bush's plan by Barbara Miner, managing editor of Rethinking Schools, which was published recently in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
• A collection of articles and resources on the pitfalls of school vouchers.
• Excerpts from "Failing Our Kids," a Rethinking Schools book that explains how an over-reliance on standardized testing dumbs down our schools and shortchanges students, particularly students of color and those from low-income families.
• "Learning to Read Scientifically," by Gerald Coles. Bush has called for "scientifically based" reading instruction, but what does he really mean by that? A close-up look at the commander in chief's "fuzzy science" when it comes to teaching kids to read. (Originally published in the Summer 2001 issue of the journal.)
• "Bush's Bad Idea for Bilingual Education," by Stephen Krashen. The president wants a three-year limit for non-English speakers to attain "English fluency." Here's why that's a big mistake. (Originally published in the Summer 2001 issue of the journal.)
• "Vouchers, Accountability, and Money -- A Rethinking Schools Editorial." Voucher backers are ignoring key lessons from Milwaukee's voucher experience, including higher tax burdens and less accountability for academic achievement. (Originally published in the Summer 2001 issue of the journal.)

You can also download the Bush plan in PDF format and read it for yourself. The file is 1.8 megabytes. If you need the Acrobat Reader, click here.