Education

Background on Education Inequality

Hundreds of billions of dollars each year when young people drop out of high school because of lost productivity and tax revenues. The nation is decreasingly competitive in the world economy. In addition, those most directly affected by inadequate education are less and less civically engaged.

What are the issues of educational reform?

What’s the main point?

School choice is a widely debated movement focused on affording parents the right to choose which school their child attends.

Types of School Choice

• Intradistrict Choice: System that allows parents to select among schools within their home districts.
• Controlled Choice: System that requires families to choose a school within a community but choices can be restricted so as to ensure the racial, gender, and socioeconomic balance of each school.
• Magnet Schools: Public schools that offer specialized programs, often deliberately designed and located so as to attract students to otherwise unpopular areas or schools.
• Charter Schools: Publicly sponsored schools that are substantially free of direct administrative control by the government, but are held accountable for achieving certain levels of student performance.
• Voucher Plans: Federal funds that enable public school students to attend schools of their choice, public or private. 

WHY?

Many believe that privatization of our education system will produce positive results.

• If schools are run like businesses, principles of competition will force the schools to provide higher quality education. Schools will be held accountable by the parents and students who choose to attend. If the schools do not meet their needs, the schools risk losing their "consumers" or student body.
• Market based policies will spur innovation and improvement in the school system. These programs will empower teachers and administrators to change the system with minimal interference from the government.
• School choice will provide better opportunities for economically disadvantaged students who are trapped in failing schools.

WHY NOT?

The traditional public school system should be responsible for education in the United States.

• Introducing market-based principles undermines the democratic nature of our school system.
• School choice only provides a band-aid solution to the problem by providing an out to a very small number of students – tackling each student’s situation individually rather than the issue as a whole. To change the problem, we must address the current system’s failure instead of starting from scratch.
• Schools will have no incentive to follow national guidelines and meet national expectations because they will have too much freedom to address their personal goals. Schools across the country will not be providing an equal education for all students.

Sources:
PBS Frontline
Framing Issues in the School Choice Debate
Teachers College of Columbia University

Facts about Education and Poverty

1. In 2006, nearly 37 million people Americans lived in poverty; 12.8 million were under the age of 18.
2. In the US, poverty is still tied to race: 33% of black children live below the poverty line while 10% of white children do.
3. School budgets are tied to property taxes. This is why schools in poor neighborhoods get about half as much money per student than schools in affluent neighborhoods.
4. Three-quarters of the nation's schools (almost 60,000) report needing repairs, renovations or modernization in order to reach good condition.
5. Not surprisingly, most schools in bad condition are in cities where at least 70% of students are below the poverty line.
6. Urban students are less likely to graduate than their suburban counterparts. High school graduation rates are 15% lower in the nation’s urban schools when compared with those located in the suburbs.
7. Graduation rates are also lower among certain groups, particularly ethnic minorities and males. In 2004, the graduation rate among African-Americans was 53.4% compared to 76.2% for whites.
8. In 2004, 17 of the nation's 50 largest cities had high school graduation rateslower than 50%, with the lowest rates reported in Detroit (24.9%), Indianapolis (30.5%) and Cleveland (34.1%).
9. Children of poor families are up to six times more likely to drop out than wealthy children.

Seattle Public Schools Student Growth 2010

The Center on Reinventing Public Education mapped an analysis of schools based on absolute performance (% of students who meet state math/reading standards, earn credits and graduate on-time) and growth performance (% of students who improve in math/reading as compared to prior year).


This map color-codes schools based on their performance levels.

View Seattle Public Schools Student Growth 2010 in a larger map

LEGEND:
Red = Level 1
Low Overall Absolute Performance and Low-to-Medium Overall Growth Performance
Orange = Level 2
Medium-Low Overall Absolute Performance and Low-to-Medium Overall Growth Performance
Yellow = Level 3
Low or Medium-Low Overall Absolute Performance and High Overall Growth Performance or Medium-High Overall Absolute Performance
Green = Level 4
High Overall Absolute Performance (w/ Free and Reduced Price Lunch Achievement Gap)
Blue = Level 5
High Overall Absolute Performance (w/ no Free and Reduced Price Lunch Achievement Gap)

In the Seattle area most poor people live south of highway 90. Sadly, most of the school who are low in absolute academic performance are also south of highway 90.  This is a social justice issue. How long will we allow for the poverty cycle to continue? How can we get involved to assure that everyone receives a quality education?

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             Environmental justice is more than just about a neighborhood, parks and access to grocery stores. It is also about providing equal opportunity for everyone to receive a proper education. The daunting statistics of low high-school graduation rates of African American and Latino males is alarming. According to the 2010 Schott 50 State Report on Black Males in Public Education, for the 2007-2008 school year only a meager 47% of African American males, and 57% of Latino males graduated from high school compared to 75% of their White counterparts. These low graduation rates are not because of their lack of capacity, it is about attending poorly funded schools and facing disproportionately large number of stressor compared to their white counterparts. 
              Poverty seems to be a key indicator of academic failure. The United States census (2009) reports that 35.4% of African American and 33.1% of Latino children under the age of 18 live in poverty. Often times with poverty comes poor nutrition, lack of access to quality food, proper clothing amongst other limiting factors. Consequently, these children tend to lack in their academic performance (Stull, 2002; Anderson & Larson, 2009). No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 aims at increasing national standardized testing scores in basic reading and math across the nation, however, many of its critics believe that this policy actually increases segregation in public schools (Saenz, V. B. & Ponjuan, L. 2009). Segregation tends to have a larger negative effect on students with low-socioeconomic status due to the lack of resources available for them.

              Because a disproportionate number of African American and Latino families live in areas of concentrated poverty, their children are more likely to attend large urban schools that are inadequately funded (Cooper & Jordan, 2001). “These communities are marred by multiple social ills such as violence and crime, unemployment, drug abuse, poor public health, and teenage childbirth-along with an educational system that reproduces social inequality, rather than transforming it” (Cooper & Jordan, 2001). Thus, affecting graduation rates and continuing the cycle of poverty and lack of education. 

References 

Anderson, N. S. & Larson, C. L. (2009). “Sinking, like quicksand” expanding educational opportunity for young men of color. Educational Administration Quarterly, 45(1), 71-114.

Jordan, W. J. & Cooper, R. (2001). Racial and cultural issues related to comprehensive school reform: The case of African American males. ED452315

Saenz, V. B. & Ponjuan, L. (2009). The vanishing Latino male in higher education. Journal of Hispanic Higher Educator, 8(1), 54-89.  

Stull, J. C. (2002). The determinants of achievement: minority students compared to nonminority students. ED474820

United States Bureau of the Census, Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2009, Report P60, n.238, Table B-2, pp 62-67.

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What can you Do?

1.    Vote- not everyone has the right to vote. Be sure to exercise your right, your privilege, and become and advocate for those who cannot speak for themselves.

2.    Get involved- there are many organizations who advocate for an equitable education, become a part of a larger cause.
http://www.dosomething.org/whatsyourthing/Education/Education+Inequalities

3.    Inform yourself- learn about how funding to schools is distributed. Learn where the money goes.