The AFT has been instrumental in winning an important concession for paraprofessionals still trying to meet job qualification requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act. The Department of Education on June 16 confirmed it will extend the deadline for paraprofessionals to meet the NCLB mandates to the end of the 2005-06 school year, which is in line with other deadlines in the law.

Until now, the deadline for paraprofessionals to meet new qualifications for working in schools receiving Title I funds had been Jan. 8, 2006. Because that deadline falls in the middle of the school year, however, many districts were actually moving up the deadline. Notably, NCLB allows school districts to use Title I funds to help paraprofessionals meet these requirements.

The decision by the department followed a letter from AFT president Edward J. McElroy to Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings outlining the union's concerns about the earlier deadline in a May 4 letter, and Spellings agreed to the extension after meeting with McElroy and hearing from members of Congress on the issue.

The decision "recognizes and corrects one of NCLB's several unintended consequences—the inequity that until now existed in the time provided for teachers and paraprofessionals to demonstrate their qualifications," said McElroy in a statement.

Confirmation of the decision came through a statement from Deputy Secretary of Education Ray Simon, who said, "It's unusual to have a deadline in the middle of the school year, and we believe that the paraprofessional and highly qualified teacher provisions should be consistent. Therefore, the department will align its monitoring and enforcement efforts of states for both the highly qualified teacher and paraprofessional provisions of the law.

The full text of President McElroy's May 4 letter to Secretary Spellings is posted online.
[Dan Gursky, Trish Gorman]

June 17, 2005