Class Matters. Why Won’t We Admit It?
I encourage you to read this excellent Op Ed piece, “Class Matters. Why Won’t We Admit It?” from the New York Times (11 December 2011): www.nytimes.com/2011/12/12/opinion/the-unaddressed-link-between-poverty-and-education.html. Witten by Helen Ladd, Duke University professor of public policy and economics, and Edward Fiske, former education editor at the NY Times,the Op Ed piece summarizes a longer report by Ladd, “Education and Poverty: Confronting the Evidence“.
Ladd and Friske summarize the evidence that clearly demonstrates that “students from disadvantaged households perform less well in school, on average, than their peers from more advantaged backgrounds.” In fact, economic disparities now account for a greater portion of differences in student achievement than does race: “…trac[ing] the achievement gap between children from high-income and low-income families over the last 50 years [shows] that it now far exceeds the gap between white and black students. Data from the National Assessment of Educational Porgress [NAEP} show 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.” Similar results are seen internationally, as found in data from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA). They ask, “Can anyone credibly believe that the mediocre overall performance of American students on international testts is unrelated to the fact that one-fifth of American children live in poverty?”
They then evaluate current U.S. educational policy, which seems “…blind to all this. No Child Left Behind required all schools to bring all students to high levels of achievement but took no note of the challenges that disadvantaged students face.” NCLB specified that “subgroups — defined by income, minority staatus and proficiency in English — must meet the same achievement standard. But it did so only to make sure schools did not ignore their disadvantaged students — not to help them address the challenges they carry with them into the classroom.”
They then ask why “presumably well-intentioned policy makers ignore, or deny, the correlations of family background and student achievement” and offer several possible explanations: perhaps they believe schools are capable of offsetting the effects of poverty; or they note that some schools, like the KIPP charters, have managed to beat the odds, and so all schools ought to be able to do so, not looking at the “substantial outside funding or extraordinary long working hours on the part of teachers” that make the comparison unrealistic.
But the “more nefarious” possible explanation is the view that I personally have come to believe: that it is part of a calculated effort to “discredit the public education system and lend support to arguments that the system is failing and needs fundamental change, like privatization.” As I have said for some time now, while I am not generally prone to subscribe to conspiracy theories, I do believe that NCLB was carefully crafted to do just this: discredit public schools and lead to increased support for charters, vouchers, and finally the dismantling and privatization of public education. Such a campaign fits neatly into the Friedmanesque “neo-liberal” agenda of dismantling public sector support for social services such as health, education and welfare.
Ladd and Friske do however answer the question, “what can be done? Large bodies of research have shown how poor health and nutrition inhibit child development and learning and, conversely, how high-quality early childhood and preschool education programs can enhance them. … Since they can’t take on poverty itself, education policy makers should try to provide poor students with the social support and experiences that middle-class students enjoy as a matter of course.” Some examples include:
- “In North Carolina, the two-year-old East Durham Children’s Initiative is one of many efforts around the country to replicate Geoffrey Canada’s well-known success with the Harlem Children’s Zone.
- “Say Yes to Education in Syracuse, NY supports access to afterschool programs and summer camps and places social workers in schools.
- “In Omaha, NB, Building Bright Futures sponsors school-based health centers and offers mentoring and enrichment services.
- “Citizen Schools, based in Boston, MA recruits volunteers in seven states to share interests and skills with middle-class students.
- “Promise Neighborhoods, an Obama administration effort that gives grants to programs like these, is a welcome first step, but it has been under-financed.
- “Other countries already provide such strategies. In Finland, with its famously high-performing schools, schools provide food and free health care for students. Developmental needs are assessed early. Counseling services are abundant.
“But in the United States over the past decade, it became fashionable among supporters of the ‘no excuses’ approach to school improvement to accuse anyone raising the poverty issue of letting schools off the hook… Such accusations may afford the illusion of a high moral ground, but they stand in the way of serious efforts to improve education and, for that matter, go a long go a long way to explain why No Child Left Behind has not worked.
“Yes, we need to make sure that all children, and particularly disadvantaged children, have access to good schools, as defined by the quality of teachers and principals and of internal policies and practices.
“But let’s not pretend that family background does not matter and can be overlooked. Let’s agree that we know a lot about how to address the ways in which poverty undermines student learning. Whether we choose to face up to that reality is ultimately a moral question.”
Well said!
Thanks to Diane Ravitch for her blog post; I highly recommend the blog Bridging Differences co-written by Diane Ravitch and Deborah Meier, as well as Ravitch’s most recent book, The Death and Life of the Great American School System. Ravitch and Meier have each written a number of excellent books on education and the role of education in democratic society.