They needed to show every woman and man
That they were the brainiest brains in the land
Then the thought came to them, in this meeting they made
They thought up a problem, a goal, a crusade
They heard that some students off some beaten path
Were failing at reading, science and math.

Not all of our students in schools did succeed
They all didn’t get A’ed, B’ed or even C’ed
Some students had stumbled, some had just failed
“How could this happen?” The Thinkers all wailed
They got up their dander, they got up their guff
“We won’t accept failure, Enough! Enough!”

“We will fix this dilemma,” they said with a grin
They made failure unlawful, illegal……..a sin
They demanded achievement, they ordered success
They set higher standards and made up big tests
The tests were mandated for one and for all
And they published the scores for each school, large and small

But they found that some students still didn’t excel
And the mandated testing showed things still weren’t swell
They looked at some subgroups to measure the flaws
(The problem certainly wasn’t the laws!)
Gender and Races, Disability and Creeds
Poverty, Religion, which kids are knock kneed

Dozens of subgroups, some large, some small
And one (Pacific Islanders) had no students at all
They tested the students in grades 11, 8 and 4
They ordered more testing…..and more….and more!
Some kids were embarrassed and some were ashamed
But the Thinkers insisted the schools were to blame!

We’ll punish the teachers; we’ll fire the boss
That old failing Principal isn’t much of a loss
Then we’ll order improvements, we’ll order reforms
‘Til all of those students exceed National norms
They expected things to get done yesterday
Without any guidelines or any local say

Now the end of this story will come in a while
When all of the standards are met by each child
And every student can write like Thoreau
Do calculus, trig and read like a pro
Speak several languages, know history well
Understand physics and think chemistry is swell

But for now we will struggle with NCLB
With consequences the Thinkers didn’t foresee
The problems with funding, where is the support
Who is highly qualified and who is a dork?
And the biggest question with NCLB
If no one can fail, how can anyone succeed?