financial disadvantage = educational disadvantage

There was a very interesting article in the NY Times, this weekend that I think warrants further exploration and discussion.  The article dealt with the topic of income inequality and overall school performance.  Its premise is that children who happen to be born into financially disadvantaged households perform markedly worse in school on average than their peers from more affluent backgrounds. 

This income/performance disparity is a proven fact and I will not even attempt to dispute this as it has been abundantly documented, most notably in the Equality of Educational Opportunity (Coleman) Study (EEOS), 1966 also known as the Coleman Report.  The Coleman Report was commissioned by the US Department of Health, Education, and Welfare in 1966 to assess the availability of equal educational opportunities to children of different race, color, religion and national origin.  This is an example of how use of a social survey was an instrument of national policy-making.  More recently Sean F. Reardon of Stanford University published a paper entitled, Income Inequality and Income Segregation (2010).  Reardon determined both income inequality and income segregation in the United States grew substantially from 1970 to 2000.  His study investigates whether and how income inequality affects patterns of income segregation along three dimensions—the spatial segregation of poverty and affluence; race-specific patterns of income segregation; and the geographic scale of income segregation.  In short, the achievement gap between children from high- and low-income families over the last 50 years now far exceeds the gap between white and black students.  This fact is as thought provoking as it is disturbing.  The National Assessment of Educational Progress shows that more than 40 percent of the variation in average reading scores and 46 percent of the variation in average math scores across states is associated with variation in child poverty rates.  Unfortunately, international research tells a similar story.   Results of the 2009 reading tests conducted by the Program for International Student Assessment show that, among 15-year-olds in the United States and the 13 countries whose students outperformed ours, students with lower economic and social status had far lower test scores than their more advantaged counterparts within every country.  The statistic belies the following question: can it be possible that the substandard performance of American students on international tests be unrelated to the fact that one-fifth of American children live in poverty?

Thus far, American policy makers continue to take the stance that since they cannot change the backgrounds of students and consequently should focus on the things that they can control.  For example, President George W. Bush’s signature education law, No Child Left Behind, set unrealistic expectations for the nation’s schools.  While President Barack Obama has instituted policies that have primarily concentrated on encouraging school efficiency through judging teacher performance using the test scores of their students as well as promoting the creation of charter schools to encourage competition. 

Federal education policy seems to want to bring all students to high levels of achievement but has taken no consideration for the challenges that disadvantaged students may face.  Can schools alone offset the effects of poverty?  Does the fact that some schools “make it” or “beat the odds” make it reasonable to expect that all schools will or should?  Are the effects of a few years of high quality education enough to make a significant impact in the lives of underprivileged children over the long term?  Can we really address education as a singular issue?  Since education policy makers can’t take on poverty itself, should they try to provide poor students with the social support and experiences that middle-class students enjoy as a matter of course? 

As NYC continues to struggle to open more charter schools where children have access to free and excellent education with no zip code encumbrances, the questions for me are some of the ones I posed to you, my readers.  Frankly, I'm on the fence about whether or not the academic gains are long term and charter models can be scaled up to address the needs of larger populations of disadvantaged students.  We cannot ignore that families that deal with financial crisis on a daily basis don't have the where-with-all let alone the resources to invest in enriching activities, especially during the summer months when the most learning loss occurs.  Low-income parents are in a constant struggle to provide basic care such as food, clothing, housing and the provision of adequate medical care to their families.  Given that national and state budgets are stretched and the weighty political power of conservative groups aren't likely to dedicate a significant amount of effort to the goal of poverty reduction at this time in our history, I'm not certain what this means for the low-income and financially disadvantaged children across our nation over the long haul.  I am certain, however, that having access to a high quality education, if only for a few years, will certainly not hurt.    

Weigh in faithful readers… put on your thinking caps and let’s go WAY BEYOND Z!