by Kevin P. Chavous
Huffington Post
October 23, 2012

During slavery, under some of the worse conditions known to man, slaves taught their kids to read by candlelight under the threat of death. And those kids learned.

On the heels of the great depression, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s new deal invigorated educational opportunities for poor white kids in places like Appalachia. And those kids learned.

Following the Vietnam War, thousands of Vietnamese refugees came to our nation. The vast majority of those children came to America unable to speak English and often lived with several families under one roof. And those kids learned.

In California, folks like Cesar Chavez fought for better working conditions for Latino migrant workers. While those families struggled to make ends meet, many strived to put their children in schools that would meet their needs. And those kids learned.

Throughout the history of our country, the unifying promise of America has been the hope for a better life for one’s children through education. Especially those children trapped in poverty. At every turn in our history, kids in poverty have demonstrated their ability to learn and succeed.

Today, as we struggle with what ails many of our schools, more and more emphasis is being placed on the linkage between poverty and education. It seems as though each week there is a new study trumpeting the difficulty of teaching low income children and; the fact that poverty needs to be taken into account when we delve into tissues pertaining to teacher effectiveness and the quality of a school’s overall performance.

I get all that. And I do agree that there must be better coordination of services between schools and those entities that help families in poverty. Without question, Geoffrey Canada’s Harlem Children Zone should be replicated all over America. Geoffrey understands the need to take

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National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) released the 2011 writing results mid-September 2012. The test is given to 24,000 8th graders and 28,000 12th graders in both public and private schools. This is the first computer based test NAEP has done, so for that reason, there are no comparisons to past writing tests.

The results are unfortunately substandard as usual. For both 8th grade and 12th grade, only 27% scored proficient or above. It is depressing to report that this means only about half of the nation’s student population only has a basic knowledge and understanding of writing. Basic achievement is defined as “partial mastery of prerequisite knowledge and skills that are fundamental for proficient work at each grade,” which, in other words, means not at grade level. What’s worse is that about 20% of students scored below this basic level.

The results also indicate a gap between economic groups, as measured by the federal standard of free and reduced lunch participants. Students participating in federal program scored 27 points lower than those that did not.

See results in greater detail and a statement from NCES Commissioner Jack Buckley on the NCES website.

Special Briefing from Education Nation
September 24, 2012

Cincinnati’s public school system is featured as an Education Nation case study because of its holistic approach to education, beginning with wraparound services before children have even entered kindergarten.

But while the achievement claims made by the superintendent sound promising, there is still a lot of work to be done to ensure that all of Cincinnati’s students are achieving at grade level.

The data touted says the percentage of children deemed ready for kindergarten, has increased nine percentage points since 2005 based on a standardized kindergarten readiness test. However, the total number of students deemed ready is still a very low 50 percent.

Eighth-grade math scores for Cincinnati public school students have increased 24 percentage points over the same period. It’s hard to know if that is a direct correlation to the wraparound services provided by these organizations, such as Strive, which estimates that around 100,000 children and students participate in the partnership in some fashion.

It’s clear from reviewing the Ohio Department of Education school district level report cards that at least over three years (2008-09 through 2010-11), proficiency in Cincinnati has increased modestly in most grades and in both math and reading. Third graders increased their proficiency in reading and math by ten percent over a three-year period, and tenth graders increased their proficiency by eight points in reading and seven points in math. However there is no record of scores over the last five years and tests have changed — dramatically. The question is how is this being measured?

More importantly, the urban district has affluent schools and poor schools. What is the disaggregated data for poor and wealthy schools? Education Trust did a path breaking report on this issue several years ago and found that many overall district’s progress actually masked

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“Charter Schools Celebrate Test Score Gains”
by Yasmeen Khan
New York Times
July 17, 2012

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, while congratulating traditional district schools for making improvements on state test scores, on Tuesday reiterated his support for more charter schools.

“I think they demonstrate again and again and again that that model gives superior results,” Mr. Bloomberg said at a news conference at the Tweed Courthouse, where he discussed the state test results.

For the third year, the city’s charter schools outperformed traditional public schools in math and English, and the spread in results between the two groups has increased.

In math, 72 percent of charter school students passed the state tests this year, compared with 60 percent of traditional public school students. In English, 51.5 percent of charter school students passed this year’s tests compared with 46.9 percent of traditional public school students. (About 30,000 charter school students took the tests; 400,000 students took the tests in traditional public schools.)

“What we’re seeing, and what we’ve seen all along,” said James Merriman, chief executive officer of the New York City Charter School Center, “is that the longer school day and longer school year that characterizes charter schools, as well as simply a focus on instruction and the sense of having a schoolwide culture that everyone buys into, results in these kinds of achievement scores.”

Critics of charter schools argue that charters attract some of the best students from the community, while enrolling far fewer students with special needs and English language learners than do traditional public schools.

Mr. Merriman said that he understood these concerns, and that demographics do matter when discussing data.

But with that in mind, he said, the fact that charter school students have improved by about nine percentage points on both the English language arts and math tests since 2010 “is cause for optimism in

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The Florida Department of Education released its annual study on charter school achievement comparing charters to conventional public schools. The most recent data (2010-2011 school year) show that in most subgroups, charter schools in Florida are doing better than their conventional counterparts. Some highlights from the report include:

• Six percent of Florida’s public school students are enrolled in charter schools.
• The percent of charter schools receiving a state grade of ‘A’ has increased from 42 percent in 2002-03 to 58 percent in 2010-11.
• More charter schools are receiving an ‘A’ than conventional public schools.
• More charter school students have consistently received a three or higher on the reading portion of the FCAT than their conventional school counterparts.
• Florida charter schools also ranked higher (in terms of how many students got a three or higher on their FCAT) when the study broke down the data into grades and subgroups by race.
• Charter school students outperformed traditional public school students in 50 of the 54 comparisons in this report.

Overall, charters have been improving academically year by year and have taken the lead in most subjects and across most sub-groups. It’s no wonder that charter schools are in high demand throughout the Sunshine State. Click here for the complete list of charter schools in Florida.

“Voucher students improve on reading, study finds”
by Erin Richards
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
February 26, 2012