Nation at Risk, A

A Nation at Risk was issued by the National Commission on Excellence in Education, which found poor academic performance at every level of schooling. Signaling the development of new priorities for the federal government's approach to education reform, it was used by President Ronald Reagan's administration to frame the education debate in cold war terms and warned of a “rising tide of mediocrity.” The report equated the state of education in the United States to an “act of war” and made direct comparisons between the economic competitiveness of the U.S. economy and other countries, particularly Japan, South Korea, and Germany. Additionally, the report cited a number of “indicators of risk” that included declining SAT scores; low student scores in literacy, science, and math; and poor showings on international comparisons of student achievement.

The commission placed the blame for these academic shortcomings on incompetent teachers and lazy students and offered the following recommendations, some of which have had moderate success, as noted below:

• Calling for strengthened graduation requirements, the report stressed a core curriculum and recommended that all students take a minimum of 4 years of English, 3 years of mathematics, 3 years of science, 3 years of social studies, and one-half year of computer science. In 2005, the U.S. Education Department found that 36% of high school graduates had completed such a curriculum, improved from 26% in 1990.
• Schools and colleges should adopt more rigorous and measurable standards for academic performance. Although some state standards aimed high, critics report that most states have selected tests that do not measure what is actually taught. Critics also contend that an unintended by-product of this recommendation is a teaching-to-the-test mentality that has resulted in a curricular reductionism that gives little attention to curriculum content not assessed by accountability tests. Many districts now impose test-preparation drills on their teachers and students rather than teaching all academic subjects.
• The amount of time students spend engaged in learning should be significantly increased to 7-hour days with a 200- to 220-day year. Only a few charter schools have extended days and the school year, but most public school systems have not.
• The teaching profession should be strengthened through higher standards for preparation and professional growth, and salaries should be professionally competitive. Although a recommendation in this 1983 report, this became mandated through the No Child Left Behind Law of 2001, when every teacher had to be “highly qualified.”
• Citizens should hold educators and elected officials responsible for leadership and fiscal support to drive reform. Although many governors have called themselves “education governors,” few have chosen to reform public schools. Rather, they have chosen to support school vouchers and choice options.

Truly a watershed moment in educational policy, the report served as a demarcation for the start of the curriculum standards movement. It also inaugurated a series of attacks on public schools and ultimately united politicians and businessmen into claiming control over the country's public education system.

In 1989, the nation's governors met in Charlottesville, Virginia, with President George H. W. Bush. The general consensus at the education summit was that despite grave concerns announced in A Nation at Risk, little had been accomplished in terms of student achievement. In a final press release, conference participants stressed the need for creating a “system of accountability” and called for more systematic reporting of school, district, and state performance; increased parental choice; school-based management; and alternative certification for teachers. Thus, Bush's education summit represents a pivotal turning point because it links the politically driven, but essentially unmandated, A Nation at Risk of 1983 to the legal enactment of national education policy that culminated in President George W. Bush's No Child Left Behind Act.

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