Berkeley Proves Jay Mathews’ Case

by Robert Pondiscio
December 28th, 2009

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Posted in Education Practice, Teaching, accountability | 28 Comments »

A few weeks ago the Washington Post’s Jay Mathews complained that focusing on eliminating the goal of achievement gap is ”useless” as a measure of school improvement.   “Our gap fixation puts us in a very awkward position,” he wrote, since “it forces us to hope that white kids, or middle class kids, or high achieving kids, don’t improve.”   As if to demonstrate Mathews’ case, California’s Berkeley High School is considering a plan to eliminate science labs and five science teachers to free up more resources to help struggling students.  Information presented at the school’s governance council meetings reportedly suggested that the science labs were “largely classes for white students.”

(H/T: Joanne Jacobs)

WH Official: Hispanics Lack “Sense of Urgency” on Education

by Robert Pondiscio
December 8th, 2009

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Posted in Education News, Parents, accountability | No Comments »

Here’s a comment I haven’t seen repeated or discussed anywhere.  Juan Sepulveda, director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans, said in New Mexico last week that Hispanics aren’t being aggressive enough about closing the academic achievement gap.  According to a report in the Albuquerque Journal, Sepulveda has visited 18 states discussing the Hispanic achievement gap and “noticed a disturbing trend”:

The most surprising thing…in our conversations is what I didn’t hear, and that was a sense of urgency,” Sepulveda said at a summit in Albuquerque. “We hope you can step up to help us to create the national will, the political will to say, ‘This is something that has to happen now,’ and to create a sense of urgency that we can’t lose another generation.”

To its credit, the Obama Administration has been clear and consistent in preaching the gospel of parental responsibility (to what degree that is reflected in its policies is up for debate), most notably in the President’s “put away the Xbox” speech to the NAACP.  Sepulveda’s remarks can be viewed in that light. 

I’ll defer to Sepulveda’s take, even if it feels not quite right.  Anecdotal observations from my time teaching mostly Hispanic kids in the South Bronx drives my perception:  The families I worked with, often first or second generation Americans, defered almost reflexively to school personnel on issues of student performance, and even on discipline.  It feels to me that the issue is not a lack of urgency, but what I interpreted as a lack of experience advocating on their children’s behalf, plus few models of what effective schooling looks like.  In short, the parents of the students I worked with were not critical consumers of education.  If the school said “your child is doing fine” or “we’re doing just fine” there was almost always taken at face value.  There was very little pushback.

Sharpton’s Media Maven Takes an Ill-Advised Bow

by Robert Pondiscio
December 7th, 2009

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Posted in Education News, Opinion | 1 Comment »

It’s PR 101 that publicists should be seen and not heard.  And not even seen.  Feast your eyes, then, on this curious piece in the New York Daily News about Al Sharpton’s “media adviser” Rachel Noerdlinger. 

Sharpton’s leadership role in the Education Equality Project has given pause to some who would otherwise be expected to support its strong accountability positions and efforts to close the achievement gap.  Fordham’s Checker Finn, most notably, described Sharpton as “one of America’s more unlovable figures, whose fingerprints can be found on an appalling list of divisive, racist, anti-Semitic, violent, and often bloody episodes over the past quarter century.”

The piece details the low-profile Noerdlinger’s work in helping “the oft-reviled Sharpton adopt a more mainstream image–witness his current national tour with former GOP Congressman Newt Gingrich in support of better education policies.”   What comes out of Noerdlinger’s mouth is eyebrow-raising:

Every day we see more acceptance of Rev. Sharpton by mainstream media, who used to see him as being opportunistic. Now he’s not as reactive. What we do now is much more strategic. We really think about what we’re doing before we do it now, because we impact so many people. I’d like to think I had something to do with that, but again, you can’t take credit for Rev. Sharpton. I like to think I am part of a well-oiled machine.”

So  is Sharpton pushing EEP because his heart is in the “new civil rights struggle” or because he’s cynically trying to “adopt a more mainstream image?”   If you want to change people’s perception, you change your act not your strategy.  People who were inclined to be skeptical about Sharpton will only be more so after reading this. 

Here’s another PR bromide:  Some of the best stories are the ones that never get written.  This should have been one of them.

Gerald Bracey’s Last Testament

by Robert Pondiscio
November 9th, 2009

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Posted in Research and Reports | No Comments »

You had to know that if any education commenter could make himself heard from beyond the grave, it would be Gerald Bracey.  He was working on his 18th annual Report on the Condition of Public Education when he passed away last month.  It’s out today.  It focuses on three specific reform ideas:  Mayoral control of school districts; the idea that “high-quality” schools can eliminate the achievement gap; and the push for higher standards to improve the performance of public schools.  It will surprise no one familiar with Bracey’s work to learn he finds each policy prescription wanting. 

Agree with him, disagree with him, but it was impossible to ignore him.  Still is.

Bringing Home Life “Out of the Shadows”

by Robert Pondiscio
July 20th, 2009

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Posted in No category | 8 Comments »

Making schools better “should be only one part of our national strategy” on education, writes Harvard’s Ronald Ferguson.  “Life at home has been a relatively neglected topic and needs to come out of the shadows.” In a commentary at CNN.com Ferguson, who heads the Achievement Gap Initiative at Harvard University, says helping parents do their best needs to be as big a priority as achieving excellent schools.

This goes beyond public policies. I am talking about changes in mindsets and lifestyles in a national social and cultural movement to close achievement gaps between groups — a movement to achieve excellence with equity.  More reading at home is a place to start….Black and Hispanic students reported less leisure reading at home compared to whites, watched television more, were much more likely to have televisions in their bedrooms and (perhaps as a consequence) were more prone to become sleepy at school. Also, blacks and Hispanics, including those with college-educated parents, reported fewer books in their homes than whites whose parents had fewer years of schooling.

Ferguson cites research indicating that high achieving students across racial lines have parents who are “both responsive and demanding.”

According to the study, white parents were much more likely to be both responsive and demanding than black and Hispanic parents; whereas black parents, in particular, were often highly demanding, but tended not to be as responsive in the ways the study measured. Among early adolescents, differences along these dimensions helped account for the higher test scores of whites as compared with blacks and Hispanics.

“Findings like the above should be part of the conversation among black and Hispanic community leaders as they respond to the fact that even the children of college-educated parents often achieve at lower-than-expected levels,” Ferguson writes. 

No Excuses

by Robert Pondiscio
July 17th, 2009

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Posted in Opinion, Parents, Students | 3 Comments »

One of the biggest applause line in President Obama’s speech to the NAACP Thursday wasn’t in his prepared remarks–it came when he exhorted parents and children to take full advantage of their educational opportunities and make “no excuses.”

We have to say to our children, Yes, if you’re African American, the odds of growing up amid crime and gangs are higher. Yes, if you live in a poor neighborhood, you will face challenges that someone in a wealthy suburb does not. But that’s not a reason to get bad grades, that’s not a reason to cut class, that’s not a reason to give up on your education and drop out of school. No one has written your destiny for you. Your destiny is in your hands – and don’t you forget that.  That’s what we have to teach all of our children! No excuses! No excuses!” 

The “Your destiny is in your hands…no excuses” bit was not in the President’s prepared remarks, but both Fox News and the Huffington Post put it in their respective headlines.

In education circles, of course, the “no excuses” meme has become shorthand for schools–and especially teachers–making no excuses for poor student achievement.  It reflects the deeply held conviction by some that a school can, should, must overcome all deficits in the children it serves, regardless of outside circumstances.  It remains an excellent rallying cry, if not a realistic standard by which to measure teacher performance. 

It’s refreshing to hear the standard applied to all actors in the process, not just teachers.  The response to Obama’s off-the-cuff remark clearly demonstrates the wisdom of crowds.

Achievement Gap or Proficiency Gap?

by Robert Pondiscio
July 15th, 2009

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Posted in Assessment and Testing, Curriculum, Education News, accountability | 5 Comments »

Lots of coverage of the latest NAEP scores and what it means for efforts to close the achievement gap.  Results show efforts to close the gap “may have a limited shelf life for kids,” notes USA Today’s Greg Toppo. 

“Since the early 1990s, schools have helped minority elementary schoolers close the achievement gap in basic math and reading skills, with real progress showing up recently on a federally administered test given to thousands of kids around the time they’re in fourth grade. But by the time they get to middle school, it seems, their progress all but vanishes.”

“Some of the scores are higher than ever, some show no gains over time,” observes Diane Ravitch, a former member of the National Assessment Governing Board, which oversees and sets policy for NAEP.  “A closer look reveals that the rate of progress is no greater than–and in some cases, less than–the pre-NCLB years.

In the New York Times, Sam Dillon fixates on evolving regional differences.  “The nation’s most dramatic black-white gaps are no longer seen in Southern states like Alabama or Mississippi,” he notes, “but rather in Northern and Midwestern states like Wisconsin, Nebraska, Connecticut and Illinois.

Why does the achievement gap persist?  “African-American students are less likely than their white counterparts to be taught by teachers who know their subject matter,” Ed Trust’s Kati Haycock tells the Associated Press.  “They are less likely to be exposed to a rich and challenging curriculum,” she said. Meanwhile Richard Whitmire, citing Haycock,  points out that states that focus on early literacy skills are making more progress. 

In a non-NAEP post over at Flypaper, Mike Petrilli tosses off an interesting and provocative comment on what we mean — or what we should mean — when we say “achievement gap.”  Mike’s eyebrows went up when he heard DC Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee say that if present trends continue “within six years we will have completely eliminated the achievement gap between black and white students in the District.”  Says Petrilli:

Now that’s quite a statement. To the man on the street, it surely sounds miraculous. You mean black students in the District of Columbia, most of whom live in abject poverty in places like Anacostia, are going to be learning at the same level as the handful of white students in the system, most of whom come from affluent, well-educated families clustered on Capitol Hill and the upscale neighborhood of Chevy Chase, where houses start in the $750,000 range? Wow! Except that’s not what she means at all. She’s referring to the proficiency gap—and by boosting the percentage of black students getting to “proficiency,” she is automatically closing said gap because almost all of the white students are already over that bar. But that doesn’t mean that the average black student will be achieving at the same level as the average white student, which is what “eliminating the achievement gap” sounds like.

Talk of closing the achievement gap is “sloppy and misleading,” Petrilli notes.  “Let’s stop talking about the achievement gap entirely, and instead focus on raising achievement across the board,” he concludes. ”It’s more honest, and, in my view, more equitable, too.”

Hello, Sweetheart. Get Me Rewrite!

by Robert Pondiscio
April 29th, 2009

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Posted in Assessment and Testing, Education News | 2 Comments »

The ledes on yesterday’s NAEP numbers in papers across the country this morning:

“The basic math and reading skills of USA students have slowly, surely improved over the past 30 to 40 years, new findings show, with sharp increases among many of the nation’s lowest-performing students – especially in the past four years” – USA Today

“U.S. high-school students haven’t achieved any significant gains in reading or math for nearly four decades”  - Wall Street Journal

“Math and reading scores for 9- and 13-year-olds have risen since the 2002 enactment of No Child Left Behind, providing fuel to those who want to renew the federal law and strengthen its reach in high schools” — Washington Post

“The achievement gap between white and minority students has not narrowed in recent years, despite the focus of the No Child Left Behind law on improving the scores of blacks and Hispanics” — New York Times

The nation’s 9- and 13-year-olds are doing better in math and reading than they did decades ago, test results released Tuesday show” — Atlanta Journal Constitution

“American 17-year-olds aren’t performing any better in reading and math than their bell-bottom-clad counterparts in the early 1970s” — Christian Science Monitor

New NAEP Numbers

by Robert Pondiscio
April 28th, 2009

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Posted in No category | 2 Comments »

NAEP long-term trend numbers are out.  Headlines and links:

Improvements seen in reading and mathematics

Black students make greater gains from early 1970s than White students

Most racial/ethnic score gaps narrow compared to first assessment

For students whose parents did not finish high school, mathematics scores increase compared to 1978

Percentages of students taking higher-level mathematics increasing

USA Today’s Greg Toppo highlights sharp increases in math and reading among many of the nation’s lowest-performing students. especially in the past four years, but notes “the stubborn, decades-long achievement gap between white and minority students shrank between the 1970s and the first part of this decade, but has barely budged since 2002, when the federal government compelled public schools to address it through No Child Left Behind (NCLB).” 

Over at Curriculum Matters, Mary Ann Zehr notes average scores have remained flat for 17-year-olds both in reading and math since the early 1970s.  “The scores for 17-year-olds in reading, however, did increase by three points, to 286, from 2004 to 2008, which is considered significant. But the same was not true for 17-year-olds in math. The scores remained stagnant for that age group in math during that same period,” she notes.

Poverty, Stress and Cognitive Development

by Robert Pondiscio
April 6th, 2009

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Posted in Research and Reports | 7 Comments »

New research suggests that chronic stress may have a direct impact on the brain’s working memory–an insight with big implications for education and efforts to close the achievement gap.

“There’s been lots of evidence that low-income families are under tremendous amounts of stress, and we know that stress has many implications,” Gary W. Evans of Cornell University tells the Washington Post. “What this data raises is the possibility that it’s also related to cognitive development.”   Evans and Michelle Schamberg of Cornell published a study on the phenomenon in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences last week.  Says the Post:

Previous research into the possible causes of the achievement gap between poor and well-off children has focused on genetic factors that influence intelligence, on environmental exposure to toxins such as lead, and on the idea that disadvantaged children tend to grow up with less intellectual stimulation. But Evans, who has been gathering detailed data about 195 children from households above and below the poverty line for 14 years, decided to examine whether chronic stress might also be playing a role.

The Economist, which picked up on the story last week, summarizes how Evans and Schamberg measured the level of stress experienced by 9 to 13-year-old children:

The two researchers used an index known as allostatic load. This is a combination of the values of six variables: diastolic and systolic blood pressure; the concentrations of three stress-related hormones; and the body-mass index, a measure of obesity. For all six, a higher value indicates a more stressful life; and for all six, the values were higher, on average, in poor children than in those who were middle class. Moreover, because Dr Evans’s wider study had followed the participants from birth, the two researchers were able to estimate what proportion of each child’s life had been spent in poverty. That more precise figure, too, was correlated with the allostatic load. 

“When the researchers analyzed the relationships among how long the children lived in poverty, their allostatic load and their later working memory, they found a clear relationship,” the Post notes.  “The longer they lived in poverty, the higher their allostatic load and the lower they tended to score on working-memory tests. Those who spent their entire childhood in poverty scored about 20 percent lower on working memory than those who were never poor.

The Economist concludes the research offers a potential explanation for why the cycle of poverty is so difficult to break:  ”The Bible says, ‘the poor you will always have with you.’ Dr Evans and Dr Schamberg may have provided an important part of the explanation why.”

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