Achievement Gap
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Anonymous
There are "actionable public-policy solutions". The problem is that they aren't actionable on the city level. Particularly in a city that isn't embedded in a larger state entity. The solution is of course to implement a strong state welfare system of the kind you see in northern Europe. Since the chances of that happening any time soon are effectively zero, our best hope is to spread poverty around rather than concentrating it in a ghetto southeast of the river, but west of Eastern Ave. If you don't agree, I'm curious whether you think it wouldn't be best to get rid of the out-of-boundary rules for DCPS. After all, if concentration of poverty isnt't the fundamental intractable problem we should be able to just fix the individual schools, right? |
Anonymous
Brilliant analogy. |
Anonymous
| No there are things that can be done that may be able to help some kids stay above water and at some point in their life figure out if they want to aspire to the middle class. That means a much better content rich curriculum than we currently have. It means better communication from schools to parents. But folks should keep in mind Europe may be a lot less successful at this than one would hope especially in their ethnic enclaves. Poor kids are healthier in Europe but they are not necessarily better educated or able to get jobs. |
Anonymous
This won't happen with the current brain trust at DCPS because they are too caught up with their own supernatural powers to cajole teachers into high performance which results in raised student test scores -- no parents needed |
Anonymous
Can you point to a place that has worked as you suggest? Where has an urban system with concentrated poverty used an enriched curriculum and better communication to improve schools? |
Anonymous
Yes the turn of the twentieth century. Period of intense immigration and poverty. There were standardized primers that had a wide range of high quality literature that was used. It was not perfect but it made a huge difference. E.D. Hirsch makes a good case for this historical precedent in The Making of Americans: Democracy and Our Schools. Couple of things to think about- the gap in Math is decreasing, but not in reading. It is not just teachers. Most literacy especially at the higher grades is not about decoding it is about connecting ideas. One of the most consistent gaps we see for poor kids is their exposure to books. |
Anonymous
But the immigrant parents were often intensely involved with the kids. This doesn't get at the parental involvement problem. |
Anonymous
| You know parents were not as involved as you would think. In fact our own parents were less involved than we are. Our lack of trust in the schools is a notable cultural shift of the last 25 years. When you look at schools at the turn of the century they were notable in how much they excluded parents. |
Anonymous
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I think the idea of "parental involvement" is confusing. I think it is less about a parent hovering and helping with homework and volunteering at school than it is about a parent instilling basic values and discipline in their kids
:i.e. school is important, you must respect your teachers and fellow students, hard work is required, YOU are responsible for getting your homework finished, failure is an opportunity for learning. As well as maintaining a calm, quiet home that is conducive to studying and getting enough rest. I doubt generations of immigrant parents had time to sit and monitor homework, but they certainly instilled values of hardwork, appreciation for education and responsibility in their kids. It is not about money. I have lived in many places around the world where kids literally, truly didn't have enough to eat but even the youngest left their homes each morning in spotless uniforms, made their way to distant schools and took their lessons and their teachers with complete seriousness. Poverty does not mean kids can't acheive. That is an excuse. Parental involvement is not about time and money, it is a state of mind |
Anonymous
| And if that state of mind is not in the home, then the schools like KIPP, SEED etc., have to take over the job. Longer school days, weekends and summers to make sure that the discipline and values are coming from the school as well as/in lieu of the home. |
Anonymous
And keep in mind the consequences of this---people who don't need/want schools to take over this job and who can parent effectively and give kids what they need to be successful in school won't send their kids to those kinds of schools. And segregation will continue to be a problem as will non-economically diverse schools. |
Anonymous
| What about this: I imagine that many families who choose KIPP etc. For their kids do instill proper values and send their kids to school ready to learn. What they gain by choosing KIPP is a peer group for their kids who are guaranteed to get those same values if not from home, then at the school. No non charter school can provide that reassuring peer group. |
Anonymous
| The point is, don't assume that all kids at a KIPP like schools come from a dysfunctional family. There are many reasons that a functional, responsible parent of a good student would choose that type of school. The segregation you fear is not that big an issue, I.think. |
Anonymous
oh come on!! KIPP is all minority. No middle or upper class family is going to SEED or KIPP. Just saying that's how it plays out. People will keep seeking charters that meet their kids needs in an environment that most reflects their SES/cultural backgrounds. And when they do, the schools are accused of being elitist or ghettoist. |
Anonymous
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Somewhere between 20-30% of students at each KIPP campus in DC are classified as non-economically disadvantaged. Is that not enough to count as SES integration? |