More Education Woes

August 29th, 2007 | by Craig |

I don’t know what’s more disturbing about this article — that scores on the SAT are dropping or that better test-taking skills is the solution to the problem. How about actually teaching kids the subject so when they take the test they perform well? And, is anyone disturbed by the fact that poor kids are to blame for the drop in average scores? I refuse to accept the mindset that poverty is a barrier to learning. That mindset has led to the dumbing down of education and the mess the public school system has become.

  1. 12 Responses to “More Education Woes”

  2. By Erica on Aug 29, 2007 | Reply

    “I refuse to accept the mindset that poverty is a barrier to learning.”

    You shouldn’t have to accept it, because it’s a load of horse dreck. It just so happens that many of the people who create barriers for themselves (i.e. refuse to learn) are in a very low tax bracket. Education, until one actually gets to college, is free for anyone who wants it, and even then, if one performs really well, full or partial scholarships are available, too. I am sure I don’t need to tell you this.

  3. By Gman on Aug 29, 2007 | Reply

    Erica, I was thinking of the mindset fueled by psychologists (who, let’s face it, fuel a lot of trends in modern education) and educrats that claim that poor people are automatically handicapped because they are poor. It’s that deterministic worldview that poor people have more negative stimuli than rich kids and hence are disadvantaged. But, sure, there are opportunities out there for many to rise above. I like to see individuals do it on their own.

  4. By Shane C. Mason on Aug 29, 2007 | Reply

    “I refuse to accept the mindset that poverty is a barrier to learning.”

    So, I think that the common thought here is about the cyclic nature of poverty. Often, parents who are in these ‘lower tax brackets’ don’t provide the encouragement and environment to learn. So yeah, there are some disadvantages there.

    However, there is a middle you know? I don’t think that there are a lot of people claiming ‘lets dumb the education down’. I know that my children’s curriculum is more aggressive that when I went to school. I think that the solution is to provide an environment that everyone can learn in.

  5. By Anthony Martinez on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply

    Erica, It is a bitter fact of life that poor people do not have the same access, well equipped schools, positive environmentts etc, that middle and upper class students enjoy.
    The article did not stae poor people can not learn. It merely cited a fact that more Esl students were taking the test and this has lowered the average. If you had to take an exam in a foreign country, do you think you would do as well as a native born citizen if all other factors were equal? If you don’t think poverty is a barrier to learning, you are naive.
    Yes there are exceptions , plenty of poor people from genuine poor neighborhoods make it, but not with the ease of the the affluent.
    Take off the blinders!

  6. By carol on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply

    In my town I saw that one of the schools with the highest percentage low income students adopted the notoriously fuzzy TERC Investigations math program just last year, which is basically a box of materials like arrays and cardboard cutouts etc. It’s been widely condemned elsewhere, like NYC and California, but as usually MT is 10 years behind the times, and it’s usually the disadvantaged students who are the guinea pigs for these failed programs.

  7. By Melynda on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply

    Tests in general do not prove who is smart and who is not; they only prove who the good test-takers are. To do well in the traditional education system, one needs to be a good test-taker (especially with the whole “No Child Left Behind” debacle).

    It is unfortunate because colleges need something to quickly weed out applicants and the SATs are an easy way to do it. I bet a lot of smart kids get weeded out that way.

    Of course poverty is a barrier to education–that’s not to say that poor people can’t be academically successful, but rather that they need to work harder. No private tutors, working after school and on weekends, parents who are more focused on paying this month’s bills than getting their kids to do homework, moving from school to school as parents try to afford housing, are all possible obstacles for those in poverty. Of course the biggest obstacle of all is parents who don’t value education and don’t instill the importance of education on their kids—rich or poor.

  8. By Walter Greenspan on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply

    On the second day of school in the Washington, DC, school district, 20 percent of the enrolled students did not show up:

    http://www.washingtontimes.com/article/20070830/METRO/108300079/1001

    H/T: http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2007/08/018321.php

  9. By Mark Tokarski on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply

    I’ve seen it in my own family - among 27 cousins, all of more or less equal ability, many were raised with low expectations and were ready to settle for working class jobs, while others of us got hold of student loans or scholarships and made a jump up. We in turn raised the expectations of our children. Poverty does have a damping effect, in that children learn low expectations from parents. It can be beaten, but it is very difficult. It takes special parents. That’s why it is so hard to overcome.

  10. By Rodger Levesque on Aug 30, 2007 | Reply

    The working class should not be considered as living in poverty. Real poverty has real developmental effects. Do you refuse to accept that malnutrition is a barrier to athletic performance? The brain is an organ and like any other its development is dependent on proper nutrition.

  11. By Gman on Aug 31, 2007 | Reply

    Folks, these are some great comments and thoughts! Thank you for participating. If I may, what I love about blogging is that it makes you think about your position on things. Because of my vocation, I’m steeped in public policy on a daily basis. It’s so easy to think that your position is airtight. What I’ve learned — and a lot of this has come from bloggin — is that no public policy issue is cut and dry. If anything, blogging has made us all better advocates of our opinions and worldviews. I appreciate that everyone is willing to allow their thinking to be challenged. This is so important in a free society. When I get a chance, I’ll respond to some comments about poverty and education. Very interesting discussion.

  12. By carol on Aug 31, 2007 | Reply

    “Erica, I was thinking of the mindset fueled by psychologists (who, let’s face it, fuel a lot of trends in modern education)”

    Ed Hirsch wrote in one of his books that ed schools didn’t use mainstream psychological research but instead used their own insular “research” that was often biased anecdotal hype trying to prove someone’s pet theory and that wouldn’t pass muster at a Psych dept.

  13. By noodly appendage on Sep 1, 2007 | Reply

    Of course poverty can be an impediment to learning. It can also be an excuse, and not just for those doing the learning, but it can also be an excuse for the schools themselves.

    The real issue is that public schools are failing our kids.

    No child left behind has been implemented as no child allowed ahead.

    BTW, the “Christian schools” debate has always been a smokescreen. In reality, Catholic schools have provided excellent educations for decades. I have to overcome a certain bias myself, but educating our children to compete in a flat world has become so important that there simply must be a way of inducing change, and I think vouchers and competition are it. Mr Milton Friedman has convinced me.

    Education: “It’s for the children”… not the system.

    Here’s a link to a Friedman paper on the subject.

    http://www.schoolchoices.org/roo/fried1.htm

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