The 37th Annual Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup Poll of the Publics Attitudes toward the Public Schools

Abstract

THIS IS the 37th consecutive year for this poll. Its early success can be credited to George Gallup, Sr. Gallup considered it his poll, picked the panel to select the questions, oversaw the surveying, analyzed the results, and wrote the report. The close relationship between Phi Delta Kappa and the Gallup Organization continued after the death of George Gallup, Sr., with his son, Alec Gallup, representing that organization. Since 1992, I have had the privilege of directing the poll for PDK. Alec and I share the beliefs that the procedures used minimize the possibility of bias in the poll and present the results in user-friendly fashion. The Gallup Organization has absolute authority over the phrasing of the questions and certifies that the data support the findings and conclusions. Alec and I use the executive summary to state our best judgment as to what the data mean. Each conclusion cites the table or tables containing the data on which it is based. Some readers tell us that they read the tables first, draw their own conclusions, and then compare those with the ones we have drawn. Alec and I believe the information in this poll is unusually significant and commend it to your use.--LCR Executive Summary In this Executive Summary we present a number of findings and conclusions of this, the 37th Annual Phi Delta Kappa/ Gallup Poll of the Public's Attitudes Toward the Public Schools. Some conclusions strike us as more significant than others. Conclusions 10 and 11, for example, regarding the achievement gap, and conclusions 12 through 16, dealing with the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, seem worthy of special notice. That the public is so strong in its support for closing the achievement gap should send a clear message to policy makers. There is also a message in the conclusions related to NCLB in that they note the public's disagreement with the law's strategies and, at the same time, suggest that there is still time for midcourse corrections. Again, we feel that policy makers would do well to heed the message. Another important contribution of the poll results is that they should help to destroy one of the myths surrounding the public schools: that the public schools are losing public support. The trend lines in this poll suggest the exact opposite. The grades the public assigns the schools remain as high as ever and are truly impressive when public school parents give their evaluation; the public continues to express a strong preference for change through the existing public schools; support for choice shows no sign of increasing and could be said to be lagging; and it is the public schools to which the public turns for closing the achievement gap. Finally, before we move to the specific conclusions, it seems necessary to comment on the important distinction between the nation's schools and schools in the community. These polls have repeatedly documented that the public has a low opinion of the nation's schools and a high opinion of schools in the local community. The media, some education experts, and some government leaders base their comments on the nation's schools and are then surprised when they do not resonate with a public that is concerned primarily with the schools in the community, schools that generally draw approval. As long as those seeking to improve the public schools make their case on the supposed inadequacy of the schools in the community, support for improvement will be hard to build. We turn now to the 20 conclusions that we believe summarize the most significant findings of this year's poll. The data supporting each conclusion are provided, and the tables in which additional supporting data will be found are cited by number. 1. Lack of financial support is solidly entrenched in the public mind as the major problem facing the nation's public schools. Responding to an open-ended question, 20% of those surveyed mention lack of financial support. …