Educational Opportunity is Achievable and Affordable

Abstract

Raising academic standards while eliminating achievement gaps between advantaged and disadvantaged students are America's primary national educational goals. This pursuit of equity and excellence reflects a bipartisan consensus of presidents, governors, legislators, corporate leaders, educators, and the public forged over two decades. Linking equity with higher achievement would fulfill the promise of equal educational opportunity that the U.S. Supreme Court articulated in Brown v. Board of Education more than a half century ago. It also reflects a broad awareness that unless the nation can provide a high-quality education to all children, America will lose its ability to compete effectively in the global marketplace and will jeopardize the continued vitality of its democratic institutions. But the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) and related standards-based reform initiatives in virtually all of the states have made limited progress toward these goals. While vital school improvement efforts must continue, the nation's ambitious educational goals can't be met unless we understand and confront the core problem underlying the achievement gap: the extensive pattern of childhood poverty that inhibits educational opportunity and educational achievement. Results of the latest PISA international student assessment indicate that U.S. schools with fewer than 25% of their students living in poverty rank above the world's highest scorers among advanced industrial countries. But when you add scores of students from schools with high-poverty rates, the United States sinks to the middle of the pack. At nearly 22% and rising, the child-poverty rate in the United States is the highest among wealthy nations. (Poverty rates in Denmark and in Finland, which is justifiably celebrated as a top global performer on the PISA tests, are below 5%). In reality, America doesn't have a general education crisis; we have a poverty crisis. The effect of poverty on children's learning is profound and multidimensional. Children who grow up in poverty are much more likely to experience conditions that make learning difficult and put them at risk for academic failure. Moreover, the longer a child is poor, the more extreme the poverty, the greater the concentration of poverty, and the younger the child, the more serious the effects will be on the child's potential to succeed academically. According to a growing body of research, America will attain its goals of equity in preparing students to function effectively as citizens and productive workers only through a concerted effort to eliminate socioeconomic barriers. Our research has identified four prime areas of support services for children and youth that are most beneficial to helping children overcome the poverty-imposed impediments to educational achievement. These core areas are: * Early childhood education beginning from birth that ensures the range of development necessary to be ready for school; * Routine and preventive physical and mental health care that maintain bodies and minds that are able to learn effectively; * After-school, summer, and other expanded learning time opportunities that bolster academic learning and pro-mote social, emotional, and civic development necessary to succeed in school; and * Family engagement and support that foster students' academic development. In each area, studies commissioned by the Campaign for Educational Equity at Teachers College, Columbia University have analyzed current research and demonstrated a direct relation-ship between each factor and student achievement. For example, children who attend preschool perform better in kindergarten than peers who didn't attend preschool, and these effects are larger for lower-income students (Kagan, 2009). Poor urban youth have higher rates of asthma, which results in sleep deprivation and absenteeism that adversely affect their motivation and ability to learn in school (Basch, 2010). …