No Child Left Behind. Successful or Not Successful?

 No Child Left Behind, (NCLB), was and act that was passed in 2001. It was an act by congress about education of the children of the United States. The bill was passed May 23, 2001. The purpose of this act is to develop basic skills to all students in certain grades. There is some question about whether NCLB is successful or not. Has No Child Left Behind been successful?
   Many people would say that No Child Left Behind has been successful. It has improved test scores, increased accountability, more attention on minority populations, quality of education has increased, and there is more funding. 

"One of the best things that has come out of No Child Left Behind is the focus on the need to be proficient in math and reading," Kafer said.   
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,111386,00.html  

Others say that NCLB has not been successful because it has caused a lot of different problems. Problems such as, the high-preforming students are getting "held back" in a sense, too much focus on standardized tests,

Critics have argued that the focus on standardized testing (all students in a state take the same test under the same conditions) as the means of assessment encourages teachers to teach a narrow subset of skills that will increase test performance rather than focus on deeper understanding that can readily be transferred to similar problems.^[30] For example, if the teacher knows that all of the questions on a math test are simple addition equations (e.g., 2+3=5), then the teacher might not invest any class time on the practical applications of addition (i.e. treating 2+3=5 as a word problem) so that there will be more time for the material which is assessed on the test. This is colloquially referred to as "teaching to the test." 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act

leaving out the arts, and other electives,  and more segregation between the high and low performers.
    I found all this information by using the You Decide website and searching through Google. When I Google searched I went to both search the web and search the news. I found both very help full and definitely feel like I will continue to use these tools often.