The Ability of the No Child Left Behind Act to Enable School Reform: Beliefs of Illinois School District Superintendents

Purpose and Method of Study. The primary purpose of this research was to explore the beliefs of Illinois public school superintendents concerning the ability of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) to enable school reform. A secondary purpose of this study was to describe the extent to which those beliefs varied based on the size of school district, type of school district, location of the district, and length of experience as a superintendent. The entire population of Illinois' 868 public school superintendents for the 2008-2009 school year was asked to participate in this study. A total of 349 completed surveys (40% response rate) were included in the data analysis. The survey questions took the form of superintendent belief statements concerning the ability of NCLB to assist them in leading school reform. The data were analyzed by SPSS 17.0 software based on the frequencies of responses of the superintendents' beliefs concerning NCLB. Ordinal regression analysis identified which predictor variables impacted the outcome variable. Findings and Conclusions. The responses to the survey showed mixed results for the five beliefs as more superintendents disagreed than agreed that NCLB had helped them lead school reform, improve freedom and flexibility in working with the community, and to increase the number of educational choices available to parents. However, more superintendents agreed than disagreed that NCLB had helped them strengthen school district accountability systems and assisted them in developing goals and objectives concerning the usage of proven educational methods. Although the influence of the independent variables differed from belief to belief, the size of the school district was shown to be a significant predictor in four of the five beliefs. School district location was a significant predictor in three beliefs, and superintendent experience was a significant predictor in two beliefs. Type of district was not a significant contributor to the predictability of any of the beliefs. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]