Poverty among school children may be even higher than we thought

An important article on poverty among school children in the US by Anthony Cody, suggesting that poverty levels are even higher than we thought, followed by comments by Yvonne-Siu Runyon, President of the National Association of Teachers of English.

http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/living-in-dialogue/

How Many of Our Students Live in Poverty?

By Anthony Cody on December 4, 2010

The number we often hear for the proportion of our students who live in poverty is in the range of 20% to 23%. But Susan Ohanian has flagged some frightening data from the Department of Education's Data Express. The number of students receiving free or reduced price lunches has grown significantly, and in 2008-2009 44% of our nation's students were eligible. In the state of California, 52% are eligible. In Mississippi, 68% are eligible, and the prize for the lowest proportion goes to New Hampshire, with 20% eligible. In the city of Oakland, where I have worked for the past 24 years, more than 68% of the students were eligible.

What does this mean in terms of income? Each state sets an income level that makes one eligible. In California, a family of four with an annual gross income of less than $28,665 qualifies for a free lunch, while reduced price lunches are available for students with a family income less than $40,793.

Is this a reflection of true poverty? Think about your own family's income. I know my California household would have a very hard time getting along on this amount, and there would be no margin of safety if someone lost a job or had hours cut back. We are seeing elements of our societal safety net eroded every week. Several million Americans are about to lose unemployment benefits after having lost their jobs in the recession, and we are being told these jobs may not return. Many of these millions are parents. How are their children going to be affected by seeing their parents financially ruined?

College degrees do not offer much protection from the insecurity that has become the norm, especially for those just out of college. Andrew Sum reports

Young college educated workers, particularly those 25 and under, however, have not fared very well over the past three years. They have experienced rising joblessness, underemployment, and malemployment problems (i.e. working in jobs that do not require a college degree). During the January-August period of 2010, we estimate that fewer than 50 of every 100 young B.A.-holders held a job requiring a college degree.

In films like Waiting for Superman, student achievement in the US is compared unfavorably to outcomes in countries such as Finland. However, Finland has less than 5% of its children being raised in poverty. And the country has a strong social safety net, so that children are not in danger of eviction and deprivation.

As Stephen Krashen has pointed out, poverty is closely correlated to school achievement. Those of us who have worked in these schools know firsthand why this is so. Poverty is associated with poor health, poor nutrition, lousy day-care and pre-schools, dangerous and violent neighborhoods, family instability and even violence, poor access to dental and vision care, and so on.

Our education secretary styles himself a civil rights leader. But Arne Duncan last week gave a speech that called on us to accept that the "new normal" in education will be budget cuts and "doing more with less." This speech before the American Enterprise Institute, was lauded by National Review columnists Frederick Hess and Michael Petrilli, who wrote:

In one speech, this (Democratic) secretary of education came out swinging against "last hired, first fired," seniority-based pay raises, smaller class sizes, seat time, pay bonuses for master's degrees, and bloated special-education budgets. Which means he just declared war on the teachers' unions, parents' groups, education schools, and the special-education lobby. Not bad for a day's work.

When the unions start busing in kids, parents, and teachers to rally against increases in class size or pay freezes, expect a lot of Republican governors to start quoting their good friend Arne Duncan.

Our schools ought to be places of refuge for children in poverty. Often the free or reduced price lunch is their only solid meal of the day. Smaller class sizes allow teachers the chance to give more attention to individual students, who need it all the more when their families are financially stressed. Sadly, Secretary Duncan appears to be doing his best to clear the way for cuts to the schools and attacks on teachers and students. It looks like we are going to need to start handling this ourselves. The group I started just over a year ago, Teachers' Letters to Obama, has decided to join others in organizing a non-partisan conference and march in Washington, DC, next July 28 to 31.

Yvonne Siu-Runyan

1:00 PM on December 4, 2010

Thank you, Anthony. Yes, this country has a lot of children living in poverty.

In a UNICEF Report (2005), child poverty in the U.S. is 21.7%. It is a lot higher today.

Because of the economic downturn (recession/depression) in this country, we also have an increase in domestic violence and homeless children.

Unfortunately, schools are no longer places of refuge, but places where they are tested ad nauseam and racing to nowhere.

If we want children to have a positive educational experience, then we must admit that in this country we do not do enough for schools in neighborhoods of poverty. We would rather bail out Wall Street and keep feeding the military machinery.

Let's be honest. We MUST invest more in schools that have a high percent of children living in poverty. The academic gap is a RESOURCE gap.

Some links re: Domestic Violence:

http://www.soundvision.com/Info/domesticviolence/statistics.asp

http://www.nylawyer.com/display.php/file=/probono/news/08/052808a

http://dannimoss.wordpress.com/2008/12/20/has-economic-downturn-caused-increase-in-domestic-violence/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/dec/20/recession-domestic-violence-women

http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=ec853694d18d54c5ae

Jon Alter Kneels Again to "Micro-hard Hombre," Bill Gates

Tom Friedman and Jonathan Alter have a couple of things in common besides their principle concern for having others listen to them without interruption.

Both share an abiding faith in technocracy to solve the problems that technology creates, and both embrace a blithely-oppressive brand of self-consuming and human-gobbling capitalism that places Man squarely under the unholy, heavy Thumb of the Market's invisible Hand.  Their shared religion often brings them together to sit at the feet of high priest, Bill Gates, with their notepads at the ready to receive the Word on any number of problems, real or manufactured, that Gates pretends to know something about, while the millionaires at Microsoft scurry around developing the product lines to make Bill's wise solutions realizable in ways that increase market share

Gates had turned his eye toward the half-trillion dollars that Americans spend on education long before Rupert Murdoch hired the hapless Joel Klein to advise News Corporation on how to get in on the ed bonanza.  In fact, Gates's recent enthusiasms for hand-held data phasers led, I would guess, to Murdoch's ridiculously-overpriced purchase of Wireless Generation, the company that had NYC Schools as a client during Klein's lucrative tenure.  We must wonder how long it will take Microsoft to gobble up Wireless Generation if their ridiculous gadget can be made indispensable by the ed marketeers.

So combine Alter's worship of Gates with his schoolyard bully's attitude toward public education, and you have a very valuable propaganda weapon that Team Oligarch uses on a regular basis to soften up the ground ahead of new corporate ed campaigns.  Alter delivers in his most recent piece in the bankrupt Newsweek rag, with so many malicious distortions and sucker punches that it will take more than a single post to sort them out.  The first one comes in the lead paragraph as a familiar form of fearplay that predictably precedes the outright assault.  Ladies and gentlemen, the education crisis redux, once more, again:

Bill Gates is raising his arm, bent at the elbow, in the direction of the ceiling. The point he’s making is so important that he wants me and the pair of Gates Foundation staffers sitting in the hotel conference room in Louisville, Ky., to recognize the space between this thought and every lower-ranking argument. “If there’s one thing that can be done for the country, one thing,” Gates says, his normally modulated voice rising, “improving education rises so far above everything else!” He doesn’t say what the “else” is—deficit reduction? containing Iran? free trade?—but they’re way down toward the floor compared with the arm above that multibillion-dollar head. With the U.S. tumbling since 1995 from second in the world to 16th in college-graduation rates and to 24th place in math (for 15-year-olds), it was hard to argue the point. Our economic destiny is at stake.

Let's look at some facts before we go any further, rather than taking seriously Alter's distortions and lies that he uses to create the illusion of a disaster and, thus, making the Gates plan inevitable and urgently needed.  First off, a good reporter goes beyond Wikipedia to get his facts.  The U. S. is, in fact, 12th and not 16th in college graduation rates when compared with other developed nations.  And rather than "tumbling" down to the 12th spot, other countries, rather, have moved up faster percentage-wise in comparison to the U. S.  Finland, for instance, more than doubled the percentage of its population with bachelors' degrees from 1995 to 2007 (from 20% to 46%), while the U. S. moved up a single point from 33% to 34%.  We must wonder how much Finland's K12 reforms have contributed to this surge in college completion.  Perhaps there is some legitimacy to reforms built on rich curriculums with supportive and challenging schools for all, high-status professional teaching, and the elimination high-stakes standardized testing.

Even with eleven other countries leading the U. S. in percentages of college grads, this kind of statistic is highly misleading, as Bracey pointed out many times.  Finland's population is about 5.3 million souls, while the U. S. population exceeds 310 million.  When extrapolated from the entire population, Finland's 46 percent would represent about 2.4 million folks with degrees, whereas the U. S.'s 34 percent would represent 105 million individuals with degrees.  End of emergency, crisis, disaster, etc.

The 24th spot in math for 15 year olds is another distortion, when we take into consideration the actual numbers of American students scoring at the highest levels, when compared to Finland, Singapore, etc. From Bracey, December 9, 2008 at HuffPo:

Principle 23 of the "principles of data interpretation" that organize "Reading Educational Research: How to Avoid Getting Statistically Snookered," reads "If the situation really is as alleged ask, 'So what?'" The question does not call for some smart-ass response, it calls for an evaluation of the consequences of the situation. So the U. S. is not #1 in mathematics or science testing. So what? So, very little.

First, comparing nations on average scores is a pretty silly idea. It's like ranking runners based on average shoe size or evaluating the high school football team on the basis of how fast the average senior can run the 40-yard dash. Not much link to reality. What is likely much more important is how many high performers you have. On both TIMSS math and science, the U. S. has a much higher proportion of "advanced" scorers than the international median although the proportion is much smaller than in Asian nations.

This was not true on PISA, another international comparison that tests 15-year-olds. Only 1.5% of American students scored at the highest level compared to top performing New Zealand at 4% and second place Finland at 3.9%. Yet the proportion of Americans at the highest level meant that 70,000 kids scored there compared to about 2,000 for New Zealand and Sweden. No one else even came close--Japan was second with about 33,000 top performers. These are the people who might end up creating leading edge technology in the future. Who cares if Singapore, with about the same population as the Washington Metro Area, and Hong Kong, with about twice that number, score high? There aren't many people there. (And, as journalist Fareed Zakariya found out, the Singapore kids fade as they become adults. More about that in a moment). The bad news is that the U. S., on PISA anyway, had many more students scoring at the lowest levels; these kids likely can't compete for the good jobs in the country.

Brief interruption:  The U. S. has much a higher ranking in another important category that is not on Gates's or Alter's radar screens:

According to data compiled by the OECD in 2008, the United States has a child poverty rate of 20.6%, which makes the United States rank fourth out of thirty OECD countries ranked in that category. Turkey ranks first, with a child poverty rate of 24.6%.  

(Click chart to feel sick).

Back to Bracey's beautiful rant:

Second, test scores, at least average test scores, don't seem to be related to anything important to a national economy. Japan's kids have always done well, but the economy sank into the Pacific in 1990 and has never recovered. The two Swiss-based organizations that rank nations on global competitiveness, the Institute for Management Development and the World Economic Forum, both rank the U. S. #1 and have for a number of years. The WEF examines 12 "pillars of competitiveness," only one of which is education. We do OK there, but we shine on innovation. Innovation is the only quality of competitiveness that does not show at some point diminishing returns. Building bigger and faster airplanes can only improve productivity so much. Innovation has no such limits. When Zakariya asked the Singapore Minister of Education why his high-flying students faded in after-school years, the Minister cited creativity, ambition, and a willingness to challenge existing knowledge, all of which he thought American excelled in. But, as Bob Sternberg of Tufts University has pointed out, our obsession with standardized testing has produced one of the best instruments in the nation's history for stifling creativity.

But really, does the fate of the nation rest on how well 9- and 13-year-olds bubble in answer sheets? I don't think so. Neither does British economist, S. J. Prais. We look at the test scores and worry about the nation's economic performance. Prais looks at the economic performance and worries about the validity of the test scores: "That the United States, the world's top economic performing country, was found to have school attainments that are only middling casts fundamental doubts about the value and approach of these [international assessments]."

Third, even if comparisons of average test scores were a meaningful exercise, it only looks at one dimension--the supply side. Predictably, the results gave rise to calls for more spending on science instruction. This ignores the fact that we have more scientists and engineers than we can absorb. In one study, Lindsay Lowell of Georgetown University and Harold Salzman of the Urban Institute found that we mint three new engineers for every new job (this is from permanent residents and citizens, not foreigners). More disturbing was the attrition rate. While educators fret over losing 50% of teachers in 5 years (and well they should), Lowell and Salzman found that engineering loses 65% in two years. Why? Low pay, lousy working conditions, little chance for advancement. American schools of engineering are dominated by foreigners because only people from third world nations can view our jobs as attractive. In fact, long-time science writer, Dan Greenberg, invented a new position for those emerging with Ph.D.'s: post-doc emeritus.

Schools are doing a great job on the supply side. Business and industry are doing a lousy job on the demand side. The oil industry, responding to increased demand for oil exploration raised the entry-level salaries for petroleum engineers by 30-60%. The number of students lining up to be petroleum engineers has doubled and enrollment at Texas Tech has increased sixfold.

As usual in these comparisons, Americans in low-poverty schools look very good, even in mathematics. They would be ranked third in the 4th grade (among 36 nations) 6th in the 8th grade (among 47 nations). This is important because while other developed nations have poor children, the U. S. has a much higher proportion and a much weaker safety net. When UNICEF studied poverty in 22 wealthy nations, the U. S. ranked 21st.

Finally, there are some curiosities that will take some time to analyze. Critics are fond of pointing to the Czech Republic as a nation that spend much less than we do on schools but scores much higher. Not this time. The Czech Republic has seen catastrophic drops in its math scores since 1995, 54 points in 4th grade, 63 points in 8th grade and is now well below the United States in both grades.

Forty-percent of Koreans reached the highest level in 8th grade math. In PISA, only 1.1% did. Note that that is fewer than the 1.5% of American students at the highest level in PISA.

Then there are the gender differences: For some countries there are huge differences in 8th-grade mathematics---favoring females. Of the eight countries with the largest differences, only Thailand is not an Islamic nation. Does this reflect which girls get to go to school in these countries? I don't know.

P. S. Overall the U. S. did pretty well in both subjects at both grades.

To be continued . . .

Don't Miss...

"Reframing the Education Debate," by Pedro Noguera (via The Nation):

After two years, it has become clear that the education policies pursued by the Obama administration too closely resemble those of the Bush administration. They are leading us in the wrong direction and not producing the changes we need.

The vast number of parents and children throughout the country who rely on public schools are a natural constituency for the Democratic Party. So, too, are the 2.1 million teachers and administrators who draw their livelihoods from public education. Both groups are more likely to understand and support the need to direct public dollars not only to education but to healthcare and social welfare. They are also less likely to embrace the intolerance and fiscal conservatism of the Tea Party and the GOP right wing.

One lesson Obama should draw from his party's drubbing in the midterm elections is that this constituency is frustrated with his leadership on education. Increasingly, public school students and parents are unenthusiastic about the administration's reliance on high-stakes testing and its embrace of market-oriented reform strategies—performance pay for teachers, charter schools, etc. And many teachers have been alienated by the overt hostility toward their unions expressed by Education Secretary Arne Duncan and a growing number of Democratic politicians.

[Continued here]

Please do read on.

Ravitch TKO's Finn in first round

Chester Finn's response to Diane Ravitch (http://www.edexcellence.net/gadfly/index.cfm?issue=614#a6624) assumes that American schools have failed. Not so. Evidence for failure, according to Finn, includes "The weak and generally stagnant academic performance of most American school kids, our scandalous achievement gaps, the country’s sagging performance vis-à-vis other countries …".

Test score performance of American children is not all that "stagnant." NAEP math scores for 9 and 13 year olds have improving steadily since 1973 and reading scores for 9 year olds have been improving since 1971. Other groups show no decline (Finn would call this "stagnant," others might call this holding steady).

Achievement gaps and our less than spectacular scores on international tests are the result of poverty: Middle-class American children attending well-financed schools outscore nearly all other countries. Our overall scores are unspectacular because we have such a high percentage of children living in poverty, which has devastating effects on school performance.

Finn also proclaims that teachers and principals are not prepared, that curricula are "shoddy," and text books are "fat and junky," all without evidence. He also complains about "large expenditures with meager returns," an argument Finn has been using for years and that Gerald Bracey consistently refuted.

If the premises of Finn's argument are incorrect, his subsequent arguments do not hold. If poverty is the problem, we must look for solutions that protect children against the effects of poverty.

Ravitch wins this one: TKO in the first round.

Scott's Transition Team: Rhee, Bakke, Kirtley, Hage, etc

The ever-perky princess of education deform appeared on the Colbert Report last night, and, unfortunately, Stephen continued to disappoint when it comes to skewering corporate school propagandists.  The interview - neither enlightening nor entertaining - was a great way for Rhee to generate some positive PR in the wake of her ousting from the DC schools.

But Michelle is undoubtedly keeping herself busy.  And it looks like she'll be focusing on Florida now that Gov.-elect Rick Scott has appointed her to his education transition team.  Here's the rest of the list, courtesy of the Orlando Sentinel:

Michelle Rhee – Former Chancellor, Washington, DC Schools

Patricia Levesque – Executive Director, Foundation For Florida’s Future

MaryEllen Elia – Superintendent, Hillsborough County Schools

Ed Moore – President, Independent Colleges and Universities of Florida

J. David Armstrong, Jr. – President, Broward College and Former Chancellor of Community Colleges of Florida

John Kirtley – Chairman, Step Up For Students

Liza McFadden – President, Volunteer USA Foundation

Frank T. Brogan – Chancellor, State University System of Florida

Dr. Fred Lippman – Chancellor, Health Professions Division – Nova Southeastern University

Dennis W. Bakke – President and CEO, Imagine Schools

Dr. Judy Genshaft – President, University of South Florida

Julio Fuentes – President, Florida State Hispanic Chamber of Commerce

Carlos Curbelo – Miami Dade School Board and State Director for Sen. LeMieux

Mindy Cunningham – Principal, J Strategies

Gary R. Chartrand – Executive Chairman, Acosta Sales & Marketing Company and Board of Directors, KIPP Schools Jacksonville, Florida

Dr. Don Pemberton – Director, Lastinger Center For Learning University of Florida

Mindy Lafevers-Hodge – World History Instructor, Florida Virtual Schools

Jonathan K. Hage – President and CEO, Charter Schools USA

Yes, that's right: Scott appointed Dennis Bakke, CEO of the Imagine Schools, to his transition team.  Maybe he can get Imagine to answer some of the state's lingering questions about his company's nonprofit status, or clarify the confusion about whether or not Imagine is an education service provider (ESP).  Imagine currently operates 17 charters in Florida.

Scott also saved a spot for another for-profit CEO, Charter Schools USA's Jonathan Hage, and the executive director of Jeb's foundation, Patricia Levesque.  Another appointee, John Kirtley, a venture capitalist who also chairs the Florida School Choice Fund, generally donates to Republican candidates, but he made an exception for the folks at Democrats for Education Reform.  Kirtly is also on the board of the Alliance for School Choice.

Keep in mind that Scott's team has reportedly considered Rhee for the state's education commissioner position.

NEPC Review of Heritage Report

It's not difficult to find an edu-pundit or politician pushing reform proposals based on the so-called Florida model.  Jeb Bush pushed it as a governor and continues to push it through his foundation; Colorado Succeeds, the "business voice for education," wrote a policy paper titled, "Proving the Possible: A case study of Florida's K-12 education reforms and lessons for Colorado"; then-gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman boldly claimed "all roads lead to Florida" when it comes to education reform in bigger states; and the Education Equality Project teamed with Education Reform Now to author a review of all recent gubernatorial candidates that favored many of the same proposals.  The common claim is that Florida is closing the achievement gap with this "cocktail of reforms."

There may be some lessons to be learned from the reforms in Florida, but there's also reason to be cautious about the conclusions some have already drawn from the changes.  The Heritage Foundation, for instance, published a report, Closing the Racial Achievement Gap, praising Florida for making dramatic progress and urged other states to follow.  Here's a snippet from the abstract:

One state, Florida, has demonstrated that meaningful academic improvement—for students of all races and economic backgrounds—is possible. In 1999, Florida enacted far-reaching K–12 education reform that includes public and private school choice, charter schools, virtual education, performance-based pay for teachers, grading of schools and districts, annual tests, curbing social promotion, and alternative teacher certification. As a result of parental choice, higher standards, accountability, and flexibility, Florida’s Hispanic students are now outperforming or tied with the overall average for all students in 31 states. It is vital that national and state policymakers take the lessons of Florida’s success to heart. The future of millions of American children depends on it.

But, as you hopefully know, think tank research generally isn't peer-reviewed.  And that can lead to advocacy based on shaky grounds.  Proceed with caution.  It's always handy to keep Bracey's various literature around.  Another great resource is the National Education Policy Center.  Here's a description of Madhabi Chatterji's review of Closing the Racial Achievement Gap:

The Heritage Foundation report, Closing the Racial Achievement Gap: Learning from Florida’s Reforms, endorses a set of policies from Florida: vouchers funded by tax credits, charter schools, online education, performance-based teacher pay, grading of schools and districts primarily based on test scores of students, test-based grade retention, and alternative teacher certification. The report claims that Florida’s student achievement trends improved and gaps were substantially reduced for Black and Hispanic students because of this package of reforms. Based on these purported successes, it recommends adopting these reforms in other states. However, the central analysis compares average test scores of students in the nation versus Florida without considering key group differences, an oversight that leads to erroneous causal interpretations on effects of reforms using purely descriptive data. The report further ignores group differences resulting from the state’s mandatory grade retention policy for the weakest readers in grade 3. This policy-driven increase in grade retention rates spuriously inflated the average scores of grade 4 students on state and national assessments, making racial achievement gaps narrower. The report also fails to examine test score data on all subjects and grade levels, instead relying only on grade 4 reading, which showed the most positive results. Finally, although a great deal is known about the reform policies the report promotes, it neglects this research literature. These serious flaws call into question the report’s conclusions.

Do read the full report.

George Parker, Corporate Ed Reform Quisling, Voted Out As DC Union Head

The teachers and parents of DC Schools have another reason to celebrate this season: the Oligarchs' union pawn has been voted out by DC teachers, and a new president will take the lead in dismantling the system of teacher evaluation quackery put in place by the Broadies under Rhee.   One can imagine Rhee's lieutenant, Kaya Henderson, working on her resume this morning.  Are you listening yet, Weingarten?

From Bill Turque:

George Parker, who negotiated a contract that left D.C. teachers better paid but less secure in their jobs, has lost the presidency of the Washington Teachers' Union to General Vice President Nathan Saunders by a vote of 556 to 480.


The total vote represents less than a quarter of the of the union's 4,200 members. But Saunders,who will be installed as president effective tomorrow, said the result reflects deep unhappiness with the new IMPACT evaluation system and Parker's lack of commitment to union democracy.

The new system, introduced by former Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee in 2009, holds some teachers accountable for growth in student test scores. All teachers must meet a series of criteria for classroom performance outlined in a detailed new framework. More than 120 teachers were dismissed last summer for low IMPACT scores. Saunders has vowed to pursue all judicial, legislative and lobbying efforts to address what he considers IMPACT's unfairness.

"The teachers are very clear about what they want," Saunders said Tuesday evening. "Clearly this is a race about job security and about IMPACT. It is also a race about teachers being participatory in the process and not just reactive."

Reached at WTU offices, a subdued Parker said he accepted the results and planned no legal challenge . . ..

Mark Your Calendar: July 28-31, 2011

This could be big. Very big.  Particularly if every ed activist, teacher, and children's advocacy group gets involved to make this a national coalition-building and organizing conference topped off with a massive public demonstration for quality education.  From Children are more than test scores:

Welcome to the great American awakening

Last year I walked 400 miles in 40 days to protest the NCLB/RTTT policies. This year I am walking again, but I am bringing a few friends with me. I am not waiting for Superman, or some dynamic leader to fix public education. Instead I am walking to Washington DC again. What our public schools need most is an Awakening of the American People. An awakening is no simple task before us. The purpose of public schooling in America is enormously complex. Every once in a while, we as a people lose sight of the purpose of schooling in America. As a country we have not had a serious conversation around the purpose of education in over 150 years.

I intentionally use the term awakening because in many ways our great nation has been asleep in regards to the purpose of our public schools. The last time such a conversation was had was when the great Horace Mann fought for the very idea of a public education. He led our nations' noble fight to establish a free public school system. Horace Mann had a great vision called the "Common School Movement." It is his vision that eventually became an American awakening. It was his life's work. His vision focused on building a quality public school system that would educate not only the poor, but would also attract the sons and daughters of the very wealthy. His vision was driven by equality. Indeed the yardstick for public education would eventually become equality. While it was never perfect, equality did become the legal measure of public schools in our great nation. We have a legal history that goes back over a hundred years attesting to this fact. Mann dreamed of a system that inspires the spirit of democracy and a sense of morality. Education was the very means of preserving our democracy. The leadership of his day, on the other hand - much like today, was less inspired by morality and democracy. They did however love the idea of a competitive workforce, (ironically not much has changed). In order to sell the idea of public schools Mann had to compromise, and sell both a competitive workforce and moral citizens. Some of us today refer to this as Horace's Great Compromise. In essence this is America's covenant with a free public education. Although it was a compromise, the moral yardstick of our public school system remained equality until the legislation of No Child Left Behind.


No Child Left Behind lacked any moral compass from the start. This law reduces equality to a test score. It assumes no federal responsibility in obtaining equality. This current education reform has discarded our yardstick of equality. Simply put, the one and only indicator to measure academic success under NCLB is the test score on a standardized measure. Astonishingly NCLB claims to focus on closing the achievement gap while effectively taking the focus off equity issues. It has shifted the focus to outcomes on standardized testing as public schooling savior. Policy makers, politicians, and many of our educational leadership no longer focus on issues of race, poverty, and those Savage Inequalities that Jonathon Kozal so effectively writes about. Standardized testing is seen as the means to end inequality. Policy makers point fingers of blame at parents, teachers, schools of education, even students themselves. In my mind the very weakness of NCLB reforms are driven by their fear that America is losing its economic edge in this global world. In their mind democracy and morality come second. Sadly in some circles it may even be seen as a hindrance.

We once again have the unique opportunity to revisit our public school covenant. This awakening will be driven by two questions:
First: Is the best sole measure of a child a standardized test score?

Second: Is the ability to compete in the workforce the most important outcome of our public schools?

If the answer is a resounding yes, then indeed all that matters is a test of basic academic skills in math, reading, and writing. Unequivocally, I believe that as Americans we expect so much more from our public schools. Morality matters to Americans. In particular it matters to the parents and caregivers of the children in our public schools. Character counts in America. Without a doubt the very principles of democracy matter a whole lot to the people of our great nation. NCLB has thrown the balance so far out of whack that the very fabric of our nation is in danger.

This awakening is so much more than NCLB. It is more than a simple test score, or even education reform. This awakening is about a covenant that has been broken. It must be fixed. In order to do this we need a movement that returns us to a conversation around our nation's public schooling covenant.

Some people naively think parents, teachers, and Americans in general are not ready for this kind of discussion. On the contrary, I believe this is what Americans are born to do. I plan on bringing this conversation to our people. I have great faith in Americans and their do the right thing attitude when push comes to shove. With NCLB push has come to shove. For this reason I walked 400 miles from Connecticut to Washington D.C. this past summer. It is why I am walking again next year. While my simple metaphor to begin this awakening was "Children Are More Than Test Scores" it really must be so much more. It must be a call to action. A call to reclaim our schools; reclaim our schools from fear. We need to return to Horace Mann's vision of purpose.

My walk ended this year on Labor Day on the campus of the American University. Those sitting at our presentation didn't want this to be the end. Instead our group of NCLB resisters said this is only the beginning. All of those present had followed my walk from Connecticut to D.C. (via the internet) since I started out in May. We knew we wanted to continue this conversation beyond test scores. So began our conversation around a balanced and fair assessment system. This will be a system that respects children, teachers, and local schools. This on-going conversation opens the door to the awakening. We as a group, parents, teachers, and academics, have been working hard on planning a series of actions against NCLB, (SOS's March/Teach-in July '11).

America and our public schools need every voice. We need to elevate this conversation to something more than the failure of NCLB. We must be reminded that public schools are at the heart of what makes us America. I think it is imperative to move congress, the senate, and the White House, but first of all we need to move the people of America. The rest will follow.

It is to the people of America I make this call, to the Mom's and the Dad's, the builders and the firefighters, the nurses and the teachers, you are our voice, our hope. I have always thought that each and every one of us can be the hope for each other. Together our voice is loud and clear, and only together can we move mountains.

I am not pessimistic these days. I am not fearful that the day is in danger of being lost. I am convinced this wakening is already happening. No congress, or senate, not even the president can stop this conversation now. We are beyond the tipping point. There is a choice, either get out of the way, or come ride our wave. I love the idea that every tidal wave has its origins in a single drop of rain. Are you part of the coming tidal wave? What is holding you back? Hold on this is going to be one heck of a ride. Teachers and parents come join us in Washington DC. It is your voice that is often missing in this extremely important discussion. Employees of public schools, the teachers and principals of the schools that we all cherish, are very vulnerable in all of this. They and their unions are the targets of so many of the current reformers. They can very easily be dismissed or moved, at the drop of a hat. You are unique. You can do something powerful by speaking up for someone who is crying inside. The teacher or principal that you've known forever may be too fearful to speak up. I call upon you all, especially grandparents, retired teachers and principals. You are the powerful potential.

It was Abraham Lincoln who shared: "I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live by the light that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right, and stand with him while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong".

Rather than tell people what to do, I prefer to say "Why not come join us in Washington DC this July 28th to July 31st, and become a pivotal part of the Save Our Schools Awakening." To connect with this, please join our group, Children are More than Test Scores.

Standing by those that stand right!
Jesse P. Turner

Ravitch is right. Gates is wrong.

Ravitch is right, Gates is wrong. My comment on "Ravitch answers Gates," The Answer Sheet: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/diane-ravitch/ravitch-answers-gates.html

Ravitch is right, Gates is wrong. And those who think American education is broken are wrong, and so are those who think that Ravitch et al (I think I'm the et in et al) do not believe in helping children develop basic skills.

1. Poverty is the issue. Students from middle-class homes who attend well-funded schools score near the top on international tests. Our mediocre average scores are because we have such a high percentage of children living in poverty compared to other industrialized countries. This shows that poverty is indeed the factor. (Yes, I am aware of our "low" math scores in a recent analysis. We were beaten by two clear outliers, Korea and Taiwan) and countries with small populations, including Lichtenstein, Iceland, Switzerland and the Netherlands. We were also beaten by Hong Kong, not a country. And those high scorers did not do nearly as well on tests of science and reading.
2. Basic skills: the approaches we endorse consistently produce excellent results in the basic skills, better than skill-based approaches. I will be happy to post sources, references, citations from the professional literature.
3. The answer is, as Ravitch says, dealing with poverty, i.e. protecting all children from the effects of poverty. This means nutrition (I was happy to see Arne Duncan giving strong support to this recently), better health care (e.g. more school nurses) and far more access to books – classroom libraries, school libraries, and public libraries in areas of high poverty. Wide reading is the major source of the vocabulary and knowledge that children of poverty often lack, and current studies strongly suggest that providing a source of books can make up for the negative effect of poverty on reading proficiency.
   

Geoffrey Canada, in his autobiography Fist, Stick, Gun, Knife, informs us that outside of school voluntary reading contributed substantially to his school success: "I loved reading, and my mother, who read voraciously too, allowed me to have her novels after she finished them. My strong reading background allowed me to have an easier time of it in most of my classes."

More on the "STEM shortage"

A story in the Chronicle of Higher Education reported that the percentage of foreign students studying for PhD's in science and engineering in the US is down.

Of great interest is this paragraph discussing the reasons for the drop:

"The Obama administration and the Bush administration before it both sought to encourage such enrollment, calling foreign students critical to the future of the United States' technological and economic competitiveness. Many in Congress have pushed back, however, reflecting voter fears that foreigners would compete for scarce jobs."

"Scarce jobs" for PhD's in science and engineering? Isn't there supposed to be a huge shortage in science and technology trained experts, with far more open positions than qualified applicants?

"American universities see decline in foreigners earning science doctorates"

http://us.mg1.mail.yahoo.com/dc/launch?.gx=1&.rand=3fsv7s9th0g0t

For more articles doubting the STEM shortage: http://www.phds.org/the-big-picture/scientist-shortages/