Brian Cohen
  • Making the Grade Blog
  • About Me
  • Tutoring
  • Press
  • Resources to Share

The nasty truth: Poverty affects learning

7/18/2012

4 Comments

 
Picture
Omarina Cabrera on her way to school.
"My first year here, me and my mom got evicted."

That is the first thing Omarina Cabrera said in a Frontline documentary entitled Middle School Moment that premiered yesterday on PBS. As a child with a single mother there was little money to support her efforts in school and she became one of the numerous students across the country to struggle in her education. Luckily she was one of the few who was helped by the system her school put in place: a group of teachers and counselors who were able to craft plans to support these struggling students. But, there is an important caveat: with reduced funding, this won't be enough without help from other adults outside the school. 

Picture
Percentage of married parents
A recent article in the New York Times pointed out yet another issue plaguing parents/guardians and their children: lack of both parents. As the number of single mothers has increased over the past 30 years, the income for those families has decreased and their children have suffered because of it.

Children in wealthier families are able to participate in sports and other extracurricular activities that enrich and support their learning; children in more poverty-like situations do not have the money for those activities and the adults in their lives lack the time for it as well.



Why am I sharing these two recent examples of poverty's effects on students across the country? Mainly because the administration of the United States does not seem to pay enough attention to it. 

Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post write a great piece yesterday regarding poverty's effects in education and how the government is ignoring what it should be doing. She pointed out a quote from Stanford Professor of Education Linda Darling-Hammond in saying:

Poverty rates make a huge difference in student achievement. Few people are aware, for example, that in 2009 U.S. schools with fewer than 10 percent of student in poverty ranked first among all nations on the Programme for International Achievement tests in reading, while those serving more than 75 percent of students in poverty scored alongside nations like Serbia, ranking about fiftieth.

So why then are President Obama and Secretary of Education faltering? Because of their blatant push for unachievable standards and lack of research-based knowledge in their proposals. Just today the Obama administration announced a core effort to provide payment bonuses for teachers who are willing to share their knowledge. While this sounds like a great idea in thought, it goes against what teachers say they want! In my previous post, I shared a graph from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation report entitled Primary Sources in which merit-pay was the last item on the list. 

I appreciate the energy they are obviously putting into these ideas but they need to put in more thought before getting them off the ground. If we are to use education as a way of getting control of the cycle of poverty, we need to focus on supporting the effort every step of the way: before, during, and after school hours, with parents and community members participating, with support from social workers and non-profits across the country. Only then will we truly be able to say we are the "land of the free."
4 Comments
PhillyTeacher
7/18/2012 11:26:24 am

Thank you for your post. The impact of poverty - in all its forms (economic, emotional, social, etc.) - impacts not only education in the US but around the world. This is also not new. My grandparents had to drop out of school to work to support their families in junior/senior high. My dad moved 7 times in his first 8 years - he was held back and did not graduate until he was 21. In some countries, families are forced to chose which children can attend schools and which can not. While these examples may seem more extreme, the daily grind of not having basic needs met has to impact a student's ability to be successful in school. Yes, there are exceptions but the cycle and "drag" of poverty can be overwhelming not only for students/families but also teachers.

Reply
NancyLee Bergey
7/19/2012 03:57:16 am

This comment from a July 16th letter to the editor of the NYTimes from STEPHEN KRASHEN, professor emeritus at the University of Southern California Rossier School of Education, drove this point home, too.

The mediocre performance of American students on international tests seems to show that our schools are doing poorly. But students from middle-class homes who attend well-funded schools rank among the best in the world on these tests, which means that teaching is not the problem. The problem is poverty. Our overall scores are unspectacular because so many American children live in poverty (23 percent, ranking us 34th out of 35 “economically advanced countries”).

How can we stand to be 34th out of 35 on this metric?

Reply
sam reed
7/19/2012 09:59:47 am

Nancy,
Great connection. I submitted a response to Krashen's NYTIMES letter. Maybe they will pick up my response that echoes some the same assertions in this post. The only caveat I added is if we do not deal with tax and real estate assesment we will not improve improve the quality of school choice for most low income families.

Reply
NancyLee
7/20/2012 01:43:32 am

I could not agree more!

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Author

    I am a math teacher in the New York Department of Education. I infuse technology and real-world problems into my curriculum in order to prepare my students for the future. I would love for people across the country to recognize we teachers can't do it alone. If you don't believe me, come visit my classroom!

    Picture

    Contact Me

    Picture

    Email Updates

    Enter your email address:

    Delivered by FeedBurner

    Archives

    March 2022
    September 2021
    August 2021
    September 2020
    August 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    August 2018
    June 2018
    April 2018
    September 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.