Place and community-based education is a teaching style that connects the students to their community. There are three key models in place and community-based education. The first key point is to connect the content that is being taught to the outside world. Second, everyone needs to have a voice, including the students, parents, teachers, administrators and the greater community. Third, there needs to be inclusion of the culture of the students being taught. Traditional schools do not work for everyone, and that is why community based education is important. By combining these key elements, place and community based education is able to inspire and truly reach their students. .
The No Child Left Behind Act makes it kind of difficult for place and community-based education to work in schools. The No Child Left Behind Act was made in 2001 to try and make sure kids did not fall through the cracks. However, No Child Left Behind did not work out the way it was intended to. Now teachers need to make sure that their students are making adequate yearly progress, only making it harder to create a curriculum that intrigues the students. If the students do not meet the yearly progress they are expected to meet, the teachers are fired or moved around to different schools (p. 33). When a teacher is constantly moved around to different schools it makes it hard to build a strong community for them and the students. No Child Left Behind also makes the public school system very competitive. Smith and Sobel (2010) state: "Many students who define themselves as losers eventually resign themselves to their own exclusion from the schools and society's rewards despite repeated messages about the tie-in between educational attainment and earning power. That resignation manifests itself in their unwillingness to invest attention or energy in the hard work of learning" (p. 33). For students to get the most out of their education they need to want to invest time into their school work.
