Closing the Achievement Gap: A Metaphor for Children Left Behind

The No Child Left Behind Act presents an unprecedented challenge to current educational policy matters. While aimed at addressing the needs of disadvantaged children by claiming to promote equity, justice, and social citizenship among all youth, the new accountability seems to be concerned more with the imperatives of the marketplace. The education framework currently in place becomes a vehicle for social mobility for those few privileged citizens who have the resources and power to make their choices matter, but merely a form of social constraint for those who lack such resources. This paper problematizes the current efforts of reform and examines to what extent they actually benefit the children they are designed to serve.