Topeka ? The U.S. Department of Education announced Tuesday that it has granted Kansas a three-year extension on its waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind law, even as Congress is considering an overhaul of that law that could make the waiver unnecessary.

In a statement released Tuesday, the department said the state of Kansas has implemented sufficient measures aimed at improving the performance of all students to justify extending the waiver.

No Child Left Behind is the latest version of the 1960s-era Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which directs the flow of federal aid for public schools, especially for schools located in low-income areas, known as Title I schools.

Under No Child Left Behind, all schools were supposed to demonstrate by 2014 that 100 percent of their students were proficient in reading and math, based on their performance on yearly state assessments.

That law was due for reauthorization in 2007. But after years of congressional gridlock on the issue, the Obama administration in 2012 began offering waivers to states if they agreed to implement other education reform measures.

Those included adopting rigorous academic standards for reading and math, such as the Common Core State Standards; adopting methods of holding schools and districts accountable for improving student performance; and adopting evaluation systems that tied teacher and administrator evaluations to those test scores.

“As a result of our partnerships with state and district leaders to couple flexibility with reform, we are seeing remarkable strides and bold actions to improve student outcomes,” U.S. Education Secretary Arnie Duncan said in a statement. “States, districts, principals and teachers are showing incredible creativity in using different means to achieve the same goal — getting every student in America college- and career-ready.”

Kansas adopted the Common Core standards in 2010, long before the waivers were announced, and they received little notice for the first two years until conservative groups in several states launched sharp attacks, arguing they amounted to a federal mandate and an intrusion into state authority over education.

Several attempts have been made in the Kansas Legislature to repeal those standards, but so far those efforts have not been successful.

The new teacher and principal evaluation system also met with resistance from many teachers unions. While the new evaluation systems are now in place, districts will not start using test scores as an element in employment or promotion decisions for at least another year.

Meanwhile, Congress is now considering bills to overhaul No Child Left Behind in a way that would likely make the waivers unnecessary.

Earlier this year, the House passed a bill, known as the Student Success Act, which contained a “portability” provision that would allow Title I funding to follow the students, regardless of where they attend school. President Barack Obama threatened to veto that bill, saying it would divert federal aid away from low-income districts that need it the most.

The Senate is expected to take up its own reauthorization bill, possibly within the next week or two. The Every Student Achieves Act passed unanimously out of the Health Education Labor and Pensions Committee, which is chaired by Kansas Sen. Pat Roberts.