Formative assessment throughout the school year and better training for school leaders are among the plans for turning around sub-par schools that six states will try under a pilot program this year.

The six states are getting the OK to write their own prescriptions for ailing schools under the Bush administration's signature education law, No Child Left Behind (NCLB).

It's a softening of how NCLB currently works, with schools having to take certain steps at specific times for missing math and reading testing goals. Critics have complained that this approach is too rigid and treats schools the same, regardless of whether they miss the mark by a little or a lot.

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The states getting more freedom under the new pilot program are Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Illinois, Maryland, and Ohio. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings plans to make the announcement during a speech today (July 1) in Austin, Texas.

The states that won approval have come up with plans to more closely tailor solutions to individual schools' problems and focus resources on schools in the worst shape.

"We expect to see a closer fit between the causes of school underperformance and a focused attention at repairing those sources of failure," said Margaret Raymond, director of the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO), an education think tank at Stanford University, and the chair of a panel that reviewed the state proposals.

Examples of changes the states plan to make include requiring schools to offer tutoring earlier than is currently called for and a greater reliance, in Indiana for example, on testing throughout the year to catch academic weak spots.

Maryland is placing more emphasis on training principals. It's common under the law for failing schools to replace their principals. "We think principal leadership is key. It's not just changing a principal, it's ensuring principals have the necessary skill sets," said Maryland schools superintendent Nancy Grasmick.