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The Obama administration鈥檚 proposal to revamp the signature yardstick used to measure schools鈥� progress under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act is being seen as a bold step toward revising a key feature of the law, even as questions loom about how a new system would work.

Under the plan, adequate yearly progress, or AYP鈥攖he accountability vehicle at the heart of the current version of the law, the 8-year-old No Child Left Behind Act鈥攚ould be replaced with a new metric that would measure student progress toward readiness for college or a career.

Though many details remain up in the air, some education advocates say the administration proposal outlined in its fiscal 2011 budget request last week is a good first step.

The administration is 鈥渃onceptually headed in the right direction,鈥� said Kati Haycock, the president of the Education Trust, a Washington-based organization that advocates on behalf of poor and minority children. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e trying to drag states to more rigorous expectations, 鈥� and they鈥檙e moving toward a more nuanced set of decisions that don鈥檛 make it just pass/fail.鈥�

But some practitioners in the field already are voicing qualms about the feasibility of the proposal.

Mark Bielang, the superintendent of the 2,300-student Paw Paw school system in Michigan, said that injecting such an as-yet-undefined standard of college and career readiness could prove vexing, given how many different skill sets are represented in the spectrum of careers.

鈥淚 don鈥檛 know how you collect the data that鈥檚 meaningful to say that a school is achieving [the equivalent of] AYP, especially when it comes to a career-readiness standard,鈥� Mr. Bielang said. 鈥淒ifferent skills apply to different careers. It seems a lot more like a portfolio-based [assessment] system would be appropriate.鈥�

He added, 鈥淗ow do you determine, for a special education student, what career-ready means for them?鈥�

Those and other questions abound about the proposal: How would college- and career-ready be defined? How would schools鈥攁nd students鈥攂e assessed? What penalties or interventions would be employed for schools that failed to hit the targets?

And, just as critically, what will Congress make of the plan?

Gauging Achievement

Adequate yearly progress has been among the most publicly visible鈥攁nd widely debated鈥攑ortions of the No Child Left Behind law since its inception, with states and districts retooling their assessments, instructional plans, and even schedules in order to meet AYP targets.

Under the current law, schools must test students in reading and mathematics at least once a year in grades 3-8, and once in high school.

Schools that fail to make adequate progress, both for the student population as a whole and for individual subgroups, such as students who are in special education or are members of racial or ethnic minority groups, are subject to increasingly serious penalties.

The law sets a goal of bringing all students to proficiency by the end of the 2013-14 school year, a target that critics have deemed highly unrealistic.

The U.S. Department of Education has not yet determined whether it would keep in place the current law鈥檚 2014 deadline for bringing all students to proficiency, Secretary Arne Duncan said last week. And he has given few other specifics on just how a new metric would work, saying that it is still being discussed on a bipartisan basis with members of Congress and that 鈥渆verything is on the table.鈥�

Congressional reaction to the proposals has been muted so far, with education leaders in both houses still studying the proposals.

The plan leaves quite a lot for lawmakers and the administration to discuss, education observers say.

Jack Jennings, the president of the Center on Education Policy, a research organization in Washington, said many educators see the AYP model as 鈥渁n unfair measure of a school and its effectiveness.鈥� Mr. Jennings, who served as an education aide to House Democrats for nearly three decades, said the challenge will be figuring out what to replace it with.

Vic Klatt, a longtime aide to Republicans on the House Education and Labor Committee who now works as a lobbyist for Van Scoyoc Associates in Washington, wanted to know: 鈥淲hat standards are they talking about here? Is there going to be an accountability system based on common standards that don鈥檛 exist yet?鈥�

And he said the administration hasn鈥檛 yet specified how it would gauge student achievement. For example, would the new law continue to rely primarily on state standardized tests, or would other measures, such as portfolios of student work or local tests, be in the mix?

The proposal also isn鈥檛 specific on what sanctions would apply under the revised law for schools that are missing the law鈥檚 achievement targets for one or two particular subgroups of students, Mr. Klatt added.

Guidance for the NCLB law鈥檚 $546 million School Turnaround grants, which became final late last year, makes clear how the administration wants to transform struggling schools. But it鈥檚 less certain what it would do to ensure the students served by those schools are getting a good education in the meantime鈥攑articularly if the administration decides to scrap school choice and tutoring provisions in the current law, Mr. Klatt said.

Under the plan outlined in the budget proposal, states would be asked to adopt standards that build toward college and career readiness, and implement assessments that were aligned with those standards.

That step would address a perennial criticism of the NCLB law: that it inadvertently encourages states to lower their standards to meet the current targets.

鈥淲hat we鈥檝e seen in far too many places under No Child Left Behind is that, due to political pressure, 鈥� states have dummied down standards [in] what we call a Race to the Bottom,鈥� Mr. Duncan said in a conference call with reporters following the last week鈥檚 release of the fiscal 2011 budget plan. 鈥淎nd this dummying down of standards ... absolutely leads to even those students who are graduating being much less prepared to be successful in college.鈥�

Continued Push

The push to include a role for higher standards in the revamped ESEA鈥檚 accountability system is likely to build on efforts already under way, Mr. Duncan said.

They include the Common Core State Standards Initiative, an effort by the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association to craft common, rigorous standards across states. So far, 48 states have signed on to the initiative.

The budget proposal also calls for states to establish a definition of 鈥渢eacher effectiveness鈥� that is based 鈥渋n significant part on student learning鈥� in order to tap money from the $14.5 billion in Title I grants to districts, which would be given the new name of College-and-Career-Ready Students.

States would also be called on to put in place a system that links students鈥� achievement and academic growth to their teachers and school leaders, according to the budget documents.

A revamped ESEA should retain the current law鈥檚 focus on using student outcomes to gauge schools鈥� progress and on closing achievement gaps, Secretary Duncan said. But schools would also be asked to track other measures, including student growth, as well as high school graduation and college-enrollment rates.

The secretary has also said that he envisions a new role for incentives in the law鈥檚 revamped accountability system.

For instance, if lawmakers pass the ESEA reauthorization this year, the administration would propose a $1 billion budget amendment that would include new money for Title I grants to districts, aimed at rewarding those that have made significant progress in boosting student achievement.

The amendment would also call for new money to help states develop assessments and an increase for after-school programs.

The U.S. Department of Education could unveil its ESEA proposal as early as this month.

Assistant Editor Michele McNeil contributed to this report.