President to Give 10 States a Pass on No Child Left Behind Deadline

President Obama is going to give 10 states a pass on an approaching deadline for the No Child Left Behind law. According to Fox News, the states have struggled to meet the proficiency standards for both reading and math.

The executive action taken by the president will circumvent Congress, which has been stuck trying to figure out how to rewrite the law. A White House Official confirmed the report that the 10 states will receive "flexibility" which will allow them to miss the 2014 targets for student proficiency. Those states will be required to set new targets however, and must implement plans to reward high-performing schools and punish the low-performing.

The first ten states to receive the waivers are Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Oklahoma and Tennessee. New Mexico applied for flexibility and did not get it. They are however working with the administration to get it.

Meanwhile 28 other states, and the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, have expressed their intent to receive flexibility also.

No Child Left Behind requires all students to be proficient in reading and math by 2014. The president has been critical of the law, which was passed under the George W. Bush administration.