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To all the parents who spent last week getting their kids ready as best as they could for the annual round of testing, is it just me, or does the feeling of utter futility seem to be growing instead of easing as we move through the new world order of No Child Left Behind?

You get them to bed a little earlier, actually prepare a hot breakfast instead of cold cereal, give them a pep talk and send them out the door.

Later in the day, inquiries on how it all went will invariably be met with something along the lines of "boring." By the end of the week, you learn just not to ask anymore.

This testing scenario is odd business. Really odd. I can't speak to your kid's school, but for my two middle schoolers on the West Side, testing means a mere half-dayy of school. I'm OK with that for my sixth-grader. A full day of testing is too much for her.

But I'm not convinced that a half-day of testing is the right idea for my eighth-grader.

While she's not thinking about next year, I am, and it seems to me that going into high school is a perfectly good time to lay the cornerstone of pain for the rest of your life, which will be dotted with all manner of marathon headaches.

I've learned to vet opinions on all things regarding school through a higher power because gut feelings are usually wrong.

Rose-Ann McKernan, director of Albuquerque Public Schools research, development and accountability, whose office is responsible for implementing testing for the district, has studied all-day testing versus breaking it into small pieces.

"We've seen no difference in results in using all-day testing over a period of time," she said.

It's been tried, especially at the high school level. Schools, in fact, have the option of doing it all day, if they so chose.

Either way, the results have been spotty.

Last year, nearly two-thirds of Albuquerque schools came up short on the requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act. Of the district's 128 schools, 83 were designated as not making "adequate yearly progress" in either reading or math, up from 77 schools the previous year.

A number of reasons factored into that, including the ability of learning-disabled students to test to their grade levels and the amount of English comprehension in a diverse population. Any one piece coming up short can torpedo an entire school's ranking.

In the days of all-day testing, all the questions were multiple-choice, and McKernan says now there are a lot more open-ended questions, which can bog a kid down markedly.

Fair enough. We took the hit, and now schools understand where the work has to be done.

McKernan also says that in the first year of the new tests, more than a few teachers weren't quite locked and loaded for the task, still embittered by its implementation. Staffs have settled into the reality of the stakes now, she says. Nothing like having your school's name in the paper for a couple years to get people moving.

When you talk to McKernan, it hits pretty hard how cohesive the whole approach to testing has to be for success. That includes those basics of parenting - rest and a full stomach. These are things that do not happen in all homes on any given day, let alone testing week.

"In past years, we've even had press conferences about it," McKernan said. "It's different than a regular class day, but it's still challenging for a lot of families."

She makes no prediction on how we'll fare this cycle and neither will I, but boring for the kids or not, fair for parents and administrators or not, No Child Left Behind is with us for keeps.

Perhaps it's not a bad thing. If a week of half-days and the mayhem that ensues for a parent's work schedule means we're eventually going to get things moving, I'll take it. The headaches can wait for high school.