Archive | May, 2012

Update: Don’t ignore concussions

20 May

Moi discussed concussions in Don’t ignore concussions:

Lindsey Tanner of AP reports on a new study about concussions in the article, Even mild concussions can cause lingering symptoms:

Children with even relatively mild concussions can have persistent attention and memory problems a year after their injuries, according to a study that helps identify which kids may be most at risk for lingering symptoms.

In most kids with these injuries, symptoms resolve within a few months but the study results suggest that problems may linger for up to about 20 percent, said study author Keith Owen Yeates, a neuropsychologist at Ohio State University’s Center for Biobehaviorial Health.

http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Even-mild-concussions-can-cause-lingering-symptoms-3383079.php#ixzz1oMUeQVuu

Citation:

Concussion

Time to Start Paying Attention

Frederick P. Rivara, MD, MPH

Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. Published online March 5, 2012. doi:10.1001/archpediatrics.2011.1602

Coaches and parents must be alert to signs of concussion.  WebMD has a good description of what a concussion is and the signs of concussion https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/03/06/dont-ignore-concussions/

Bryan Toporek is reporting in the Education Week article, Head Impacts in Sports May Reduce Student-Athletes’ Learning Ability:

Certain contact sports, such as football and ice hockey, may hinder some student-athletes’ ability to learn and remember new information, suggests a study published online Wednesday in the journal Neurology.

However, at a group level, repetitive head impacts over the course of a single season don’t appear to have detrimental short-term effects on cognitive function for contact-sport athletes, the study found.

Researchers examined a mostly male group of 214 contact-sport athletes and 45 noncontact-sport athletes from three Division 1 schools who completed both preseason and postseason ImPACT tests. In addition, 55 noncontact-sport athletes and 45 contact-sport athletes completed a neuropsychological test battery along with the pre- and postseason ImPACT tests.

Of the 45 contact-sport athletes who completed the neuropsychological test, 22 percent finished more than 1.5 standard deviations below their expected score. Of the 55 noncontact-sport athletes who took the same test, only 4 percent finished more than 1.5 standard deviations lower. This discrepancy was deemed statistically significant by the researchers.

These findings suggest that “there may be a subgroup of athletes for whom repetitive head impacts affect learning and memory at least on a temporary basis,” the study authors wrote.

“The good news is that overall there were few differences in the test results between the athletes in contact sports and the athletes in noncontact sports,” said study author Dr. Thomas McAllister of the New Hampshire-based Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, in a statement. “But we did find that a higher percentage of the contact-sport athletes had lower scores than would have been predicted after the season on a measure of new learning than the noncontact-sport athletes.”

The contact-sport athletes were exposed to an average of 469 separate head impacts over the course of a season, according to the study. No athlete who endured a concussion during the season was included in the study.

On a potentially positive note, the researchers didn’t find any association between accumulated head impacts over previous seasons and reduced cognitive performance when comparing contact- and noncontact-sport athletes….

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/schooled_in_sports/2012/05/head_impacts_in_sports_may_reduce_student-athletes_learning_ability.html?intc=es

Here is the citation for the study:

Cognitive effects of one season of head impacts in a cohort of collegiate contact sport athletes

  1. 1.     T.W. McAllister, MD,
  2. 2.     L.A. Flashman, PhD,
  3. 3.     A. Maerlender, PhD,
  4. 4.     R.M. Greenwald, PhD,
  5. 5.     J.G. Beckwith, MS,
  6. 6.     T.D. Tosteson, ScD,
  7. 7.     J.J. Crisco, PhD,
  8. 8.     P.G. Brolinson, DO,
  9. 9.     S.M. Duma, PhD,
  10. 10.  A.-C. Duhaime, MD,
  11. 11.  M.R. Grove, MS and
  12. 12.  J.H. Turco, MD

+ Author Affiliations

1.     From the Departments of Psychiatry (T.W.M., L.A.F., A.M., M.R.G.), Community and Family Medicine (T.D.T.), and Medicine (J.H.T.), Dartmouth Medical School, Lebanon; Simbex (R.M.G., J.G.B.), Lebanon; Thayer School of Engineering (R.M.G.), Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH; Bioengineering Laboratory, Department of Orthopaedics (J.J.C.), The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University and Rhode Island Hospital, Providence, RI; Edward Via Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine (P.G.B.), Blacksburg; Virginia Tech-Wake Forest (S.M.D.), Center for Injury Biomechanics, Blacksburg; Pediatric Neurosurgery (A.-C.D.), Children’s Hospital at Dartmouth, Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, Hanover, NH; and Pediatric Neurosurgery (A.-C.D.), Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston.
  1. Correspondence & reprint requests to Dr. McAllister:thomas.w.mcallister@dartmouth.edu

View Complete Disclosures

Abstract

Objective: To determine whether exposure to repetitive head impacts over a single season negatively affects cognitive performance in collegiate contact sport athletes.

Methods: This is a prospective cohort study at 3 Division I National Collegiate Athletic Association athletic programs. Participants were 214 Division I college varsity football and ice hockey players who wore instrumented helmets that recorded the acceleration-time history of the head following impact, and 45 noncontact sport athletes. All athletes were assessed prior to and shortly after the season with a cognitive screening battery (ImPACT) and a subgroup of athletes also were assessed with 7 measures from a neuropsychological test battery.

Results: Few cognitive differences were found between the athlete groups at the preseason or postseason assessments. However, a higher percentage of the contact sport athletes performed more poorly than predicted postseason on a measure of new learning (California Verbal Learning Test) compared to the noncontact athletes (24% vs 3.6%; p < 0.006). On 2 postseason cognitive measures (ImPACT Reaction Time and Trails 4/B), poorer performance was significantly associated with higher scores on several head impact exposure metrics.

Conclusion: Repetitive head impacts over the course of a single season may negatively impact learning in some collegiate athletes. Further work is needed to assess whether such effects are short term or persistent.

Received July 14, 2011.

Accepted January 25, 2012.

Copyright © 2012 by AAN Enterprises, Inc.

Parents must be alert to what is happening with the children when they participate in athletic events and activities.

Resources:

Concussions http://kidshealth.org/teen/safety/first_aid/concussions.html#a_What_Is_a_Concussion_and_What_Causes_It_

Concussion                                                                                                                         http://www.emedicinehealth.com/concussion/article_em.htm

Concussion-Overview

http://www.webmd.com/brain/tc/traumatic-brain-injury-concussion-overview

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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Brookings study: State grant aid goes increasingly to the wealthy

19 May

In 3rd world America: Money changes everything, moi said:

Sabrina Tavernise wrote an excellent New York Times article, Education Gap Grows Between Rich and Poor, Studies Say

It is a well-known fact that children from affluent families tend to do better in school. Yet the income divide has received far less attention from policy makers and government officials than gaps in student accomplishment by race.

Now, in analyses of long-term data published in recent months, researchers are finding that while the achievement gap between white and black students has narrowed significantly over the past few decades, the gap between rich and poor students has grown substantially during the same period.

“We have moved from a society in the 1950s and 1960s, in which race was more consequential than family income, to one today in which family income appears more determinative of educational success than race,” said Sean F. Reardon, a Stanford University sociologist. Professor Reardon is the author of a study that found that the gap in standardized test scores between affluent and low-income students had grown by about 40 percent since the 1960s, and is now double the testing gap between blacks and whites.          https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/02/11/3rd-world-america-money-changes-everything/

The increased rate of poverty has profound implications if this society believes that ALL children have the right to a good basic education.

Daniel de Vise has written the thought provoking Washington Post article, State grant aid goes increasingly to the wealthy:

But what the report really advocates is that all states base their grant programs primarily on need. Its top recommendation: “Focus resources on students whose chance of enrolling and succeeding in college will be most improved by the receipt of state support.”

A surprisingly large number of states don’t do that.

Twenty years ago, the report says, 90 percent of state grant dollars were awarded at least partly according to financial need. Today, that share has dipped to 70 percent.

At least 13 states have enacted large merit-based grant programs in the last two decades. Such programs are popular among middle-class families who vote.

The result: 35 percent of aid recipients in Louisiana come from families with family incomes above $80,000. A Georgia grant program favors students in the top income quartile.

Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah and West Virginia all award less than half of their state aid according to financial need.

An inventory of aid programs in Washington, D.C. found that just 6 percent of state-based grant aid went to students according to need. The best-known program, Tuition Assistance Grants, is open to rich and poor alike.

Virginia spends about two-fifths of grant dollars without regard to need. Maryland, by contrast, allots only 5 percent of scholarship funds without considering need.

The authors, who include college-finance guru Sandy Baum, suggest states eliminate the current complex web of aid programs and streamline the state scholarship effort into a single, simple program that targets students according to income and family size, period.

For example, a state might enact a sliding scale of aid according to income: $4,000 to a student from a family at the poverty line, $1,000 for a family earning $50,000 and a cutoff of $60,000 in household income.

This matters because states are spending a growing share of a shrinking higher-education budget on grant aid. State subsidies declined from $8,700 per student to $7,100 per student between 2008 and 2011, after inflation. Yet, over the same span, state grant aid grew from $8.4 billion to $9.2 billion.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/college-inc/post/state-grant-aid-goes-increasingly-to-the-wealthy/2012/05/15/gIQARIvHRU_blog.html

The report de Vise refers to is Beyond Need and Merit: Strengthening State Grant Programs which was released by Brookings Institute (Brookings) .

Brookings describes the report in a press release:

Editor’s Note: This report was released in conjunction with an event at Brookings on strengthening state grant programs.

Rising college tuition levels—accelerated by cuts in state funding for public universities— have combined with today’s tough economic realities to make financing a postsecondary education even more difficult for students and their families. State grant programs are more important than ever to make college possible for many students who could not otherwise afford to enroll.

For these dollars to make as much difference as possible in the lives of students and in the future of state economies, state grant programs must be designed to produce the largest possible return on taxpayers’ investment. In this report, the Brookings Institution State Grant Aid Study Group, chaired by student aid expert Sandy Baum, examines the variety of state grant programs currently in place and makes policy recommendations based on the best available research.

The group proposes moving away from the dichotomy between “need-based” and “merit-based” aid and instead designing programs that integrate targeting of students with financial need with appropriate expectations and support for college success. Here are highlights from their recommendations:

Help students with financial need

• To maximize the impact of their financial aid programs, states should do a better job of targeting aid dollars at students whose potential to succeed is most constrained by limited resources.

• Students whose options are constrained by limited resources are most likely to be affected by state grant awards—in terms of both their ability to attend college and the likelihood that they will graduate.

Consolidate and simplify

• States should consolidate programs to make the system simpler and easier for prospective students and their families to understand and navigate.

• Programs can be better targeted but still relatively simple. Look-up tables like those that would base grant eligibility only on income and family size might serve as a model.

• States should welcome federal simplification efforts and should resist any temptation to collect additional data—restoring complication even as the federal government reduces it.

• States should create a single net-price calculator that students can use to calculate the cost of attendance at every public institution in the state.

Design programs that encourage timely completion

• To encourage on-time degree attainment, state grant programs should reward concrete accomplishments such as the completion of credit hours.

• Academic requirements embodied in state grant programs should provide meaningful incentives for success in college; they should not be focused exclusively on past achievement or be so high as to exclude students on the margin of college access and success.

• States should provide second chances for students who lose funding because they do not meet targets the first time around.

Improving state grant programs in difficult financial times

• Rationing funds is unavoidable and there may be no good options under these circumstances, but some choices are worse than others. Providing assistance to those who apply early and denying aid to those who apply after the money has run out is quite arbitrary, particularly if an application deadline cannot be specified in advance.

• States under pressure to reduce their budgets quickly could lower income limits; cut grants for all recipients, with the neediest students losing the least; or build more incentives for college completion into their programs.

• States should use this time of financial exigency to carefully evaluate the effectiveness of existing grant programs and put in place systems for periodic review of these programs.

• In addition to tweaking their existing programs, states should test and evaluate innovative approaches. A pilot program found to be very successful could then be scaled up and replace another program found to be less effective.

State Profiles

Downloads

1.2 MB

210 KB

http://www.brookings.edu/research/reports/2012/05/08-grants-chingos-whitehurst

In 3rd world America: The economy affects the society of the future, moi said:

One of the major contributors to poverty in third world nations is limited access to education opportunities. Without continued sustained investment in education in this country, we are the next third world country. All over the country plans are being floated to cut back the school year or eliminate programs which help the most disadvantaged. Alexander Eichler reports in the Huffington Post article, Middle-Class Jobs Disappearing As Workforce Shifts To High-Skill, Low-Skill: Study:

America is increasingly becoming a place of high- and low-skill jobs, with less room available for a middle class.

A new report from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York shows that over the past 30 years, the U.S. workforce has shifted toward high-paying jobs that require a great deal of education — jobs in the legal, engineering or technology industries, for example — and toward low-paying jobs that require little schooling, like food preparation, maintenance and personal care.

What haven’t fared so well are the industries in the middle, like sales, teaching, construction, repair, entertainment, transportation and business — the ones where a majority of Americans end up working.

In 1980, these middle-level jobs accounted for 75 percent of the workforce. By 2009, that number had fallen to 68 percent. In the same span of time, low- and high-skill jobs had each grown as a percentage of the workforce.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/21/middle-class-jobs_n_1105502.html?ref=email_share

In order to support family creation and family preservation, there must be liveable wage jobs.                                                                                     https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2011/11/22/3rd-world-america-the-economy-affects-the-society-of-the-future/

Related:

College Board’s ‘Big Future’: Helping low-income kids apply to college                    https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/04/19/college-boards-big-future-helping-low-income-kids-apply-to-college/

The growing class divide: Parents taking out loans for kindergarten and elementary school education                                                                                                  https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/03/29/the-growing-class-divide-parents-taking-out-loans-for-kindergarten-and-elementary-school-education/

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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Johns Hopkins University report about school absenteeism

17 May

In School Absenteeism: Absent from the classroom leads to absence from participation in this society, moi said:

Education is a partnership between the student, the teacher(s) and parent(s). All parties in the partnership must share the load. The student has to arrive at school ready to learn. The parent has to set boundaries, encourage, and provide support. Teachers must be knowledgeable in their subject area and proficient in transmitting that knowledge to students. All must participate and fulfill their role in the education process.

https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/02/01/school-absenteeism-absent-from-the-classroom-leads-to-absence-from-participation-in-this-society/

John Hopkins has released the report, The Importance of Being in School: A Report on Absenteeism in the Nation’s Public Schools. Here is a summary from Everyone Graduates Center:

The Importance of Being in School: A Report on Absenteeism in the Nation’s Public Schools

America’s education system is based on the assumption that barring illness or an extraordinary event, students are in class every weekday. So strong is this assumption that it is not even measured. Indeed, it is the rare state education department, school district or principal that can tell you how many students have missed 10 percent or more of the school year or in the previous year missed a month or more school − two common definitions of chronic absence.

Because it is not measured, chronic absenteeism is not acted upon. Like bacteria in a hospital, chronic absenteeism can wreak havoc long before it is discovered. If the evidence in this report is borne out through more systematic data collection and analysis, that havoc may have already undermined school reform efforts of the past quarter century and negated the positive impact of future efforts.

Students need to attend school daily to succeed. The good news of this report is that being in school leads to succeeding in school. Achievement, especially in math, is very sensitive to attendance, and absence of even two weeks during one school year matters. Attendance also strongly affects standardized test scores and graduation and dropout rates. Educators and policymakers cannot truly understand achievement gaps or efforts to close them without considering chronic absenteeism.

Summary

Chronic absenteeism is not the same as truancy or average daily attendance – the attendance rate schools use for state report cards and federal accountability. Chronic absenteeism means missing 10 percent of a school year for any reason. A school can have average daily attendance of 90 percent and still have 40 percent of its students chronically absent, because on different days, different students make up that 90 percent.

Data from only six states address this issue: Georgia, Florida, Maryland, Nebraska, Oregon and Rhode Island. How these states measure chronic absenteeism, however, differs by number of days and by whether or not data include transfer students.

Such limited data produce only an educated guess at the size of the nation’s attendance challenge: A national rate of 10 percent chronic absenteeism seems conservative and it could be as high as 15 percent, meaning that 5 million to 7.5 million students are chronically absent. Looking at this more closely sharpens the impact. In Maryland, for instance, there are 58 elementary schools that have 50 or more chronically absent students; that is, two classrooms of students who miss more than a month of school a year. In a high school, where chronic absenteeism is higher, there are 61 schools where 250 or more students are missing a month or more of school.

The six states reported chronic absentee rates from 6 percent to 23 percent, with high poverty urban areas reporting up to one-third of students chronically absent. In poor rural areas, one in four students can miss at least a month’s worth of school. The negative impact chronic absenteeism has on school success is increased because students who are chronically absent in one year are often chronically absent in multiple years. As a result, particularly in high poverty areas, significant numbers of students are missing amounts of school that are staggering: on the order of six months to over a year, over a five year period.

Chronic absenteeism is most prevalent among low-income students. Gender and ethnic background do not appear to play a role in this. The youngest and the oldest students tend to have the highest rates of chronic absenteeism, with students attending most regularly in third through fifth grades. Chronic absenteeism begins to rise in middle school and continues climbing through 12th grade, with seniors often having the highest rate of all. The data also suggest that chronic absenteeism is concentrated in relatively few schools, with 15 percent of schools in Florida, for example, accounting for at least half of all chronically absent students.

Missing school matters:

  • In a nationally representative data set, chronic absence in kindergarten was associated with lower academic performance in first grade. The impact is twice as great for students from low-income families.
  • A Baltimore study found a strong relationship between sixth-grade attendance and the percentage of students graduating on time or within a year of their expected high school graduation.
  • Chronic absenteeism increases achievement gaps at the elementary, middle, and high school levels.
  • Because students reared in poverty benefit the most from being in school, one of the most effective strategies for providing pathways out of poverty is to do what it takes to get these students in school every day. This alone, even without improvements in the American education system, will drive up achievement, high school graduation, and college attainment rates.

Students miss school for many reasons. These can, however, be divided into three broad categories:

  • Students who cannot attend school due to illness, family responsibilities, housing instability, the need to work or involvement with the juvenile justice system.
  • Students who will not attend school to avoid bullying, unsafe conditions, harassment and embarrassment.
  • Students who do not attend school because they, or their parents, do not see the value in being there, they have something else they would rather do, or nothing stops them from skipping school.

Despite being pervasive, though overlooked, chronic absenteeism is raising flags in some schools and communities. This awareness is leading to attendance campaigns that are so vigorous and comprehensive they pay off quickly. Examples of progress nationally and at state, district, and school levels give hope to the challenge of chronic absenteeism, besides being models for others.

In addition to these efforts, both the federal government, state departments of education, and school districts need to regularly measure and report the rates of chronic absenteeism and regular attendance (missing five days or less a year) for every school. State and district policies need to encourage every student to attend school every day and support school districts, schools, non-profits, communities, and parents in using evidence-based strategies to act upon these data to propel all students to attend school daily. Mayors and governors have critical roles to play in leading inter-agency task forces that bring health, housing, justice, transportation, and education agencies together to organize coordinated efforts to help every student attend every day.

Download the Full Report

Download the full report, available here in pdf.

Download the presentation tool, available here as a  PowerPoint show.

Report Coverage in the News

New York Times

Huffington Post

http://new.every1graduates.org/the-importance-of-being-in-school/

Resources from the Johns Hopkins report:

For Schools

For Parents

For City Leaders

In Should we pay children to go to school? Moi said:

The disintegration of the family has profound implications for the education success of children.

Huffington Post is reporting in the article, Ohio High School Paying Students To Show Up, Behave In Class:

A Cincinnati high school is paying its students to go to school.

The Dohn Community High School, a charter school in Ohio, started a program this week that would pay seniors $25 weekly and underclassmen $10 weekly in Visa gift cards for showing up to class every day, being on time and behaving in school. The move aims to encourage students to stay in school and graduate from the school where 90 percent of its students live in poverty. Fewer than 20 percent are in two-parent households.

“Money is important to them,” school Chief Administrative Officer Ken Furrier told CBS Cleveland. “We can’t teach them if they’re not here.”

Every week a student is paid, an additional $5 goes into a savings account, payable upon graduation. The program is being funded by $40,000 from several areas, including private donors and federal Workforce Investment Act dollars funneled through the Easter Seals, a community-based health agency, KMSP-TV reports.

“The target is graduation,” Furrier told Reuters. “We do almost everything we can to get the kids to there.”

Critics say the school is rewarding students for basic things students should be doing already, but at Dohn, “they’re not doing it,” Principal Ramone Davenport told KMSP-TV. “We’ve tried everything else.”

Davenport tells the Associated Press that the program is already working and attendance is up. Dohn was designated by the Ohio Department of Education as an “academic emergency” last year, with just a 14 percent graduation rate during the 2010-2011 academic year. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/15/ohio-high-school-paying-s_n_1280227.html?ref=email_share

This school is dealing with the reality of certain education settings because they have not absorbed from their upbringing the thought that education is crucial to later success in life. Further, these children often face emotional and economic challenges because of their family circumstance.

In answer to whether children should be paid to come to school and achieve – for some children, this may be an option. https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/02/17/should-we-pay-children-to-go-to-school/

Related:

We give up as a society: Jailing parents because kids are truant https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2011/12/18/we-give-up-as-a-society-jailing-parents-because-kids-are-truant/

Hard truths: The failure of the family              https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2011/11/06/hard-truths-the-failure-of-the-family/

See:

Don’t skip: Schools waking up on absenteeism           http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44704948/ns/today-education_nation/t/dont-skip-schools-waking-absenteeism/

School Absenteeism, Mental Health Problems Linked http://psychcentral.com/news/2011/12/25/school-absenteeism-mental-health-problems-linked/32937.html

A National Portrait of Chronic Absenteeism in the Early Grades        http://www.nccp.org/publications/pub_771.html

Resources:

US Department Of Education Helping Series which are a number of pamphlets to help parents and caregivers

How Parents Can Help Their Child Prepare for School Assignments

The ABCs of Ready to Learn

Getting Young Children Ready to Learn

Ebony Magazine’s How to Prepare Your Child for Success

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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Schott Foundation study: An example of inequity in education

17 May

In Location, location, location: Brookings study of education disparity based upon neighborhood https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/04/18/location-location-location-brookings-study-of-education-disparity-based-upon-neighborhood/ moi said:

The increased rate of poverty has profound implications if this society believes that ALL children have the right to a good basic education. Moi blogs about education issues so the reader could be perplexed sometimes because moi often writes about other things like nutrition, families, and personal responsibility issues. Why? The reader might ask? Because children will have the most success in school if they are ready to learn. Ready to learn includes proper nutrition for a healthy body and the optimum situation for children is a healthy family. Many of societies’ problems would be lessened if the goal was a healthy child in a healthy family. There is a lot of economic stress in the country now because of unemployment and underemployment. Children feel the stress of their parents and they worry about how stable their family and living situation is. Sabrina Tavernise wrote an excellent New York Times article, Education Gap Grows Between Rich and Poor, Studies Say http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/10/education/education-gap-grows-between-rich-and-poor-studies-show.html?emc=eta1

The Brookings Institute study:

Housing Costs, Zoning, and Access to High-Scoring Schools Jonathan Rothwell, Associate Fellow and Senior Research Analyst, Metropolitan Policy Program The Brookings Institution

Downloads

See, Study Links Zoning to Education Disparities http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2012/04/19/29zoning.h31.html?tkn=WZZFADpJ4QDbHYgGkErxvyM40vV%2B6oC2KKaZ&cmp=clp-edweek

John Jackson, president of the Schott Foundation for Public Education, and Pedro Noguera, the Peter L. Agnew professor of education at New York University introduce the Schott Foundation report, “A Rotting Apple: Education Redlining in New York City,” in the Washington Post article, Why education inequality persists — and how to fix it:

A new Schott Foundation for Public Education report, “A Rotting Apple: Education Redlining in New York City,” reveals that the communities where most of the city’s poor, black and Hispanic students live suffer from New York policies and practices that give their schools the fewest resources and their students the least experienced teachers. In contrast, the best-funded schools with the highest percentage of experienced teachers are most often located in the most economically advantaged neighborhoods.

Schott’s new report documents gaps that have not only long been accepted in New York City but are also institutionalized by city and state policies.

The report finds that a black or Hispanic student is nearly four times more likely to be enrolled in one of the city’s poorest performing high schools than an Asian or white, non-Hispanic student. According to review of 2009-10 data, none of the city’s strongest schools are located in the poorest neighborhoods of Harlem, the South Bronx, and central Brooklyn. Schools with the highest scores are found in northeastern Queens, the and the Upper East Side. As a result of New York City policies, black, Latino and low-income students have very limited access to those schools.

Districts with higher poverty rates have fewer highly educated, experienced teachers and less stable teaching staffs. Students from low-income New York City families of all ethnic groups have little chance of being tested for gifted-and-talented program eligibility. Few black and Hispanic students are selected for the city’s top exam schools, such as Stuyvesant and the Bronx High School of Science.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/why-education-inequality-persists–and-how-to-fix-it/2012/05/15/gIQAXEIeSU_blog.html

Here is a portion of the press release from the Schott Foundation:

School district inequities are barrier to quality education for New York City’s poor, Black and Hispanic students, Schott Foundation report finds

FOR RELEASE:  April 17, 2012
Contacts:
Rachel Sugar, 212-245-0510
Shawna Ellis, 617-876-7700

In New York City public schools, a student’s educational outcomes and opportunity to learn are statistically more determined by where he or she lives than their abilities, according to a new report, A Rotting Apple: Education Redlining in New York City, released today by the Schott Foundation for Public Education.

Primarily because of New York City policies and practices that result in an inequitable distribution of educational resources and intensify the impact of poverty, children who are poor, Black and Hispanic have far less of an opportunity to learn the skills needed to succeed on state and federal assessments. They are also much less likely to have an opportunity to be identified for Gifted and Talented programs, to attend selective high schools or to obtain diplomas qualifying them for college or a good job. High-performing schools, on the other hand, tend to be located in economically advantaged areas.

“While the term ‘redlining’ might seem strong, this report reveals evidence of blatant disparities tantamount to Apartheid-like separations accepted in New York for far too long,” said Pedro Noguera, education professor at NYU, who wrote the foreword to the report.

“Unequal learning opportunities for poor students and students of color have become the status quo in New York City,” said John Jackson, president of the Schott Foundation. “The current policy landscape in New York does very little to give these young people access to the supports, type of schools or qualified teachers that give them a substantive opportunity to learn. We need creative leadership to promote greater equity and alignment so the city no longer relegates our neediest children to the most troubled schools with the most limited resources, thereby limiting their potential for future success.” 

Education Redlining bases its findings on an “Opportunity to Learn” Index that examines 500 NYC middle schools across the city’s 32 Community School Districts (CSDs). The report identifies a series of inequalities between and within districts—that largely correlate to race and poverty level. The Opportunity to Learn Index is calculated by sorting New York City middle schools by their results on the New York State Grade 8 English Language Arts assessment. Schools are then sorted into four citywide groups based on average test scores. The percentage of students in the highest-scoring group in each CSD indicates the opportunity that a student in that group has to attend one of the city’s top schools in their district.

Community School Districts with no schools among the top set of schools—with Opportunity to Learn indices of 0.00—are in the city’s poorest neighborhoods of Harlem, the South Bronx, and central Brooklyn. Schools with the highest scores are found in northeastern Queens, the Upper West Side, and the Upper East Side.

To read the full report, including district by district analysis and policy recommendations, click here.

Learn more and download the full report >

Policy Recommendations

The Schott Foundation’s Education Redlining report offers several recommendations for how New York City can improve education outcomes for all of its students by providing equitable access to the DOE’s best schools and programs:

The State of New York, which is legally responsible for providing a “sound basic education” to all children (Court of Appeals, CFE v. State of New York; November, 2006), has dramatically cut school aid over the past two years, in effect reversing the impacts of the CFE investments. NYS should restore and increase funding in accordance with the CFE decision.

The New York City Department of Education (NYCDOE) should adopt policies that pro- vide equitable access to the Department’s best schools and programs. For example:

  1. All New York City middle schools should offer the courses necessary for the Specialized High Schools Admissions Test (SHSAT) (e.g., Algebra II). If it is determined that extracurricular tutoring confers a competitive advantage for the SHSAT, it should be offered gratis to all students eligible for free and reduced-price meal programs.
  2. The Gifted & Talented Program Test should be administered to all prospective kindergarten students. If it is determined that extracurricular tutoring confers a competitive advantage for the Gifted & Talented Program Test, it should be offered gratis to all students eligible for free or reduced price meal programs.
  3. New York State and City Departments of Education should direct additional resources to schools on a non-competitive basis in accordance with student need: schools serving students from homes with fewer resources should receive significantly more per student funding than those serving students from homes with greater resources. The system currently in place is not adequate to this purpose.
  4. Each student who is currently a grade level or more behind in Reading should immediately be given a Personal Opportunity Plan that gives the student access to additional academic (tutor, extended day learning, ELL), social (mentor) and health supports (eye sight, dental, mental health) necessary to bring the student to grade level proficiency within a 12 to 24 month period.
  5. Every school should have an opportunity audit to determine if it has the supports and interagency relationships to offer each student a fair and substantive opportunity to learn, through access to high-quality early childhood education, highly prepared and effective teachers, college preparatory curricula, and policies and practices that promote student progress and success.
  6. The New York City Department of Education (NYCDOE) should set as a goal to bring every school’s Opportunity to Learn Index (or the equivalent) to no less than a .80 by 2015 and 1.0, like CSD 26, by 2020.
  7. The New York City Department of Education should set a maximum level for the percentage of teachers with less than three years of teaching experience in districts with current Opportunity to Learn Indexes below 0.50 (or the equivalent). That percentage should be no higher than the average percentage with less than three years of experience in the top five highest performing district in the state. The Department should also take steps to reverse the salary gap recently identified by the U. S. Department of Education between teachers in high and low poverty schools.

In The next great civil rights struggle: Disparity in education funding moi said:

If one believes that all children, regardless of that child’s status have a right to a good basic education and that society must fund and implement policies, which support this principle. Then, one must discuss the issue of equity in education. Because of the segregation, which resulted after Plessy, most folks focus their analysis of Brown almost solely on race. The issue of equity was just as important. The equity issue was explained in terms of unequal resources and unequal access to education.

People tend to cluster in neighborhoods based upon class as much as race. Good teachers tend to gravitate toward neighborhoods where they are paid well and students come from families who mirror their personal backgrounds and values. Good teachers make a difference in a child’s life. One of the difficulties in busing to achieve equity in education is that neighborhoods tend to be segregated by class as well as race. People often make sacrifices to move into neighborhoods they perceive mirror their values. That is why there must be good schools in all segments of the city and there must be good schools in all parts of this state. A good education should not depend upon one’s class or status.

I know that the lawyers in Brown were told that lawsuits were futile and that the legislatures would address the issue of segregation eventually when the public was ready. Meanwhile, several generations of African Americans waited for people to come around and say the Constitution applied to us as well. Generations of African Americans suffered in inferior schools. This state cannot sacrifice the lives of children by not addressing the issue of equity in school funding in a timely manner.

The next huge case, like Brown, will be about equity in education funding. It may not come this year or the next year. It, like Brown, may come several years after a Plessy. It will come. Equity in education funding is the civil rights issue of this century.

https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2011/12/02/the-next-great-civil-rights-struggle-disparity-in-education-funding/

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Many U.S. colleges use the ‘Common Application’

15 May

Many students are preparing to apply to college and they will be using the the “Common Application” which is used by over 450 universities including some international schools. According to the “Common Application” site:

GENERAL QUESTIONS

WHAT IS THE COMMON APPLICATION?
The Common Application is a not-for-profit organization that serves students and member institutions by providing an admission application – online and in print – that students may submit to any of our 456 members.

The Common App Online Demo for Students (Flash Movi

WHY USE IT?
Once completed online or in print, copies of the Application for Undergraduate Admission can be sent to any number of participating colleges. The same is true of the School Report, Optional Report, Midyear Report, Final Report and Teacher Evaluation forms. This allows you to spend less time on the busywork of applying for admission, and more time on what’s really important: college research, visits, essay writing, and senior year coursework.

IS IT WIDELY USED?
Absolutely! Millions of Common Applications are printed and accepted by our members each year. In addition, last year almost 2.5 million applications were submitted via the Common App Online.

IS IT TREATED FAIRLY?
YES! Our college and university members have worked together over the past 35 years to develop the application. All members fully support its use, and all give equal consideration to the Common Application and the college’s own form. Many of our members use the Common Application as their only undergraduate admission application.

CAN ALL COLLEGES PARTICIPATE?
Membership is limited to colleges and universities that evaluate students using a holistic selection process. A holistic process includes subjective as well as objective criteria, including at least one recommendation form, at least one untimed essay, and broader campus diversity considerations. The vast majority of colleges and universities in the US use only objective criteria – grades and test scores – and therefore are not eligible to join. If a college or university is not listed on this website, they are not members of the consortium. Sending the Common Application to non-members is prohibited.

WHAT IS THE COMMON APP ONLINE SCHOOL FORMS SYSTEM?
As part of the application process, schools require a variety of information to be provided by teachers and guidance counselors who have interacted with you in the high school environment. Until last year, those forms were only available as PDF files that could be printed, copied, and mailed to the appropriate colleges. Now each teacher and counselor will have the option to complete the forms online via the Common App Online School Forms system if they desire. There is no cost to you or high schools, and using the online system is completely optional for your teachers and counselor.

When you create an account on the Common App Online, you must first indicate what high school you attend. Once this information has been saved, you can access a ‘School Forms’ section of the Common App where teachers and counselors can be identified. By adding a teacher or counselor to the list of school officials, an email is triggered to the teacher or counselor with information about how to log into the Online School Forms system or how to opt for the “offline” or paper process. You are then able to track the progress of your various teachers and counselors via a screen within the Common App Online.

The Common App Online School Forms System Demo (Flash Movie) Camera

WHAT IF I’M A TRANSFER STUDENT?
There’s a Common Application for Transfer Admission as well as First-Year Admission. The Transfer Application is available primarily for online submission; however, the form can be downloaded in PDF format from our Download Forms page.

https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/FAQ.aspx

In addition to U.S. colleges, colleges in England, France, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland use the “Common Application.” For a good synopsis of the pros and cons of using the application, go to Should I Use The Common Application? http://www.usnews.com/education/blogs/college-admissions-experts/2011/09/07/should-i-use-the-common-application

Valerie Strauss writes in the Washington Post article:

When the Common Application was developed in 1975, officials hoped it would reduce the number of separate applications and essays a student applying to numerous colleges would have to complete. Actually, many colleges still require additional information, including more essays. So students, beware: There’s a lot of work to do.

So what are the undergraduate application essays? They are pretty much the same as last year, and the year before. Here are the instructions:

Please write an essay of 250-500 words on a topic of your choice or on one of the options listed below, and attach it to your application before submission. Please indicate your topic by checking the appropriate box. This personal essay helps us become acquainted with you as a person and student, apart from courses, grades, test scores, and other objective data. It will also demonstrate your ability to organize your thoughts and express yourself. NOTE: Your Common Application essay should be the same for all colleges. Do not customize it in any way for individual colleges. Colleges that want customized essay responses will ask for them on a supplement form.

* Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.

* Discuss some issue of personal, local, national, or international concern and its importance to you.

* Indicate a person who has had a significant influence on you, and describe that influence.

* Describe a character in fiction, a historical figure, or a creative work (as in art, music or science, etc.) that has had an influence on you, and explain that influence.

* A range of academic interests, personal perspectives, and life experiences adds much to the educational mix. Given your personal background, describe an experience that illustrates what you would bring to the diversity in a college community or an encounter that demonstrated the importance of diversity to you.

* Topic of your choice.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/2012-13-common-application-previews-available/2012/05/15/gIQAnQ79PU_blog.html

Applying to a college is just the first step. Students and families also have to consider the cost of particular college options.

Beckie Supiano and Elyse Ashburn have written the article, With New Lists, Federal Government Moves to Help Consumers and Prod Colleges to Limit Price Increases in the Chronicle of Higher Education about the Department of Education’s new site about college costs.

Resources:

College Preparation Checklist

College Preparation Checklist Brochure

Federal Student Aid At A Glance 2011 – 2012

Funding Education Beyond High School

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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Research: Summer bridge programs can help students succeed in college

14 May

In Helping community college students to graduate moi said:

Going to a community college is one way to reduce the cost of college.

The Lumina Foundation provides the following statistics:

  • Forty-six percent are 25 or older, and 32 percent are at least 30 years old. The average age is 29.

  • Fifty-eight percent are women.

  • Twenty-nine percent have annual household incomes less than $20,000.

  • Eighty-five percent balance studies with full-time or part-time work. More than half (54 percent) have full-time jobs.

  • Thirty percent of those who work full time also attend classes full time (12 or more credit hours). Among students 30-39 years old, the rate climbs to 41 percent.

  • Minority students constitute 30 percent of community college enrollments nationally, with Latino students representing the fastest-growing racial/ethnic population.

Source: The American Association of Community Colleges, based on material in the National Profile of Community Colleges:Trends & Statistics, Phillippe & Patton, 2000.

Many of those attending community college will need a variety of assistance to be successful in their academic career.https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/02/08/helping-community-college-students-to-graduate/

Caralee J. Adams has written the Education Week article, Colleges Offer Incoming Freshmen a Summer ‘Bridge.’

“Summer bridge programs can provide an important head start on college,” said Elisabeth Barnett, a senior research associate at Teachers College, Columbia University, and the Community College Research Center in New York. “They can increase the chances that students will enter college without needing remediation, and they can help students to gain comfort with the college environment and with themselves as college students.”

Such programs, which tend to run four to five weeks, offer intensive academic instruction. At-risk students are often recruited, and colleges generally pick up the tab as an enticement.

Students can come for the day or, at some institutions, live in the dorms. In developmental programs, classes focus on mathematics or English. Other campuses allow students to take a broader range of courses. Almost all find providing “college knowledge” through peer mentors is a valuable way to help students feel more confident about the transition to campus….

Participating in the summer programs did not lead to higher enrollment or better long-term persistence, but Ms. Barnett said they are beneficial, and schools should build on them with supports in the freshman year and beyond.

There is an increased need for remediation for the broader swath of students enrolling in college, including those who are the first generation of their families to attend, said David Hawkins, the director of public policy and research for the National Association for College Admission Counseling, or NACAC, in Arlington, Va.

“This creates a significant demand for pathways that feed into the college pipeline that allow students the time and knowledge to catch up to others who were born into families who had gone to college and were exposed to that culture,” he said.

A new NACAC survey found that 57 percent of colleges have some type of provisional-admission program, and of those, 23 percent had a summer bridge program. Other NACAC research of camp colleges (a form of summer bridge) also reported better persistence and outcomes among participants.

“It seems like we are at a breaking point on cost and remediation,” Mr. Hawkins said. “It gives reason for colleges to want to open their doors earlier.”

Recruitment Issues

Nationwide, about 40 percent of all traditional-age college students at two- and four-year colleges take a remedial course, and about 60 percent of incoming community college students are deemed not ready in at least one core subject—math, reading, or writing.

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2012/05/09/30bridge.h31.html?tkn=NTSFjDnm0FZQdpTpx9MAnzPSdg0kJXiVUEh4&intc=es

The National Center for Postsecondary Research has published a report, Getting Ready for College: An Implementation and Early Impacts Study of Eight Texas Developmental Summer Bridge Programs written by Heather D. Wathington, Elisabeth A. Barnett, Evan Weissman, Jedediah Teres, Joshua Pretlow and Aki Nakanishi.

Overview

In 2007, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) funded 22 colleges to establish developmental summer bridge programs. Aimed at providing an alternative to traditional developmental education, these programs involve intensive remedial instruction in math, reading, and/or writing and college preparation content for students entering college with low basic skills. In 2009, the National Center for Postsecondary Research (NCPR) launched an evaluation of eight developmental summer bridge programs in Texas (seven at community colleges and one at an open-admissions four-year university), the

early findings of which are described in this report. Students who participated in the study were randomly assigned to the program group or the control group. Program group students participated in the developmental summer bridge programs, while control group students received colleges’ regular services. All developmental summer bridge programs had four common features: accelerated instruction in math, reading, and/or writing; academic support; a “college knowledge” component; and the opportunity for participants to receive a $400 stipend.

The main findings of this preliminary report are:

• All eight programs in the study were implemented with reasonable

fidelity to the model framed by the THECB, but they varied on some

key dimensions.

• Program costs averaged about $1,300 per student but varied widely.

• Program group students did not enroll in either the fall or spring

semester at significantly different rates than control group students;

enrollment rates were high for both groups.

• There is evidence that the program students were more likely to pass

college-level courses in math and writing in the fall semester following

the summer programs. The findings also suggest that program students

were more likely to attempt higher level reading, writing, and math

courses compared with control group students. http://www.tc.columbia.edu/i/a/document/DSBReport.pdf

In Producing employable liberal arts grads, moi said:

One of the goals of education is to give the student sufficient basic skills to be able to leave school and be able to function at a job or correctly assess their training needs. One of the criticisms of the current education system is that it does not adequately prepare children for work or for a career.

Related:

New report takes community colleges to task https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/04/26/new-report-takes-community-colleges-to-task/

Producing employable liberal arts grads https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/04/01/producing-employable-liberal-arts-grads/

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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Technology report: Ed-Fi, the student info data base

14 May

Julia Lawrence of Education News is reporting on the growing acceptance of Ed-Fi in the article, Ed-Fi Signs Up More States, Teachers and Companies:

Collecting data on students in order to closely tailor the classroom experience to student strengths got easier last year with roll-out of Ed-Fi™ Tool Suite, a free software solution to help educators conduct useful analysis in a timely manner. Since its launch in July 2011, Ed-Fi™ has been used by schools and districts in 8 states, with 4 more taking advantage of the software’s functionality through the Shared Learning Collaborative. Nearly one in three teachers and as many students are now making use of this technology nationwide.

The software was designed to comply with the Common Education Data Standards which allows seamless transfer of knowledge between schools, school districts and the states. Companies who have licensed the software in order to integrate it in their own education-targeted products include e-Scholar, Curriculum Associates and Wireless Generation, among others. http://www.educationnews.org/technology/ed-fi-signs-up-more-states-teachers-and-companies/

The stated goal is to make student data more accessible and user-friendly for educators. A significant part of the push for more data has to with the introduction of Common Core Standards. See, Will ‘Common Core Standards’ increase education achievement? https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/02/page/2/

According to the Ed-Fi site, Ed-Fi is a product of the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation:

Developed for the K-12 sector, Ed-Fi is open, XML-based, and CEDS-aligned to integrate information from a broad range of existing sources so it can be sifted, analyzed and put to use every day.

Ed-Fi enables educators to:

  • Easily access current, accurate classroom and student-level data
  • Develop more effective, progress-based lesson plans
  • Strengthen student academic growth and achievement
  • Conduct more objective, fact-based parent-teacher dialogues
  • Integrate data from existing systems such as student information systems (SIS), grade book applications, curriculum planning systems, and benchmark testing and reporting systems

Ed-Fi enables districts and agencies to:

  • Access consistent, comparable performance data across districts, schools and states
  • Continuously monitor, assess and improve program effectiveness
  • Manage evolving compliance-reporting requirements
  • Integrate with existing infrastructures
  • Ensure system interoperability
  • Accommodate future technological developments

Ed-Fi enables vendors to:

  • Develop reusable products for multiple districts, states and other vendors
  • Align to existing national standards
  • Address shifting requirements without major code overhauls
  • Streamline and systematize complex integration processes
  • Develop productized solutions for use among multiple districts, states and vendors
  • Focus on innovations that address emerging needs and open new markets

Available free of charge, Ed-Fi licenses provide school districts, state education agencies and vendors with access to all Ed-Fi components.

About Ed-Fi and the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation

The Michael & Susan Dell Foundation was established in 1999 to help improve the lives of children in need around the world. The Ed-Fi initiative supports the goal of ensuring that all children have access to quality education in public schools, one of the foundation’s key objectives.

Designed to function as a national data standard, Ed-Fi was developed based on input from vendors as well as state and local education agencies. The Ed-Fi data standard is governed by foundation representatives working in collaboration with an advisory council of education agency representatives from states that opt to implement the standard. The Ed-Fi standard is vendor-neutral and does not require any specific vendor’s hardware, software or protocols.

http://www.ed-fi.org/about/

Here are some frequently asked questions about Ed-Fi:

General (11)

http://www.ed-fi.org/faqs/

Here is a portion of the press release from the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation:

AUSTIN, Texas, May 8, 2012 /PRNewswire/ — Since launching in July 2011, the Ed-Fi Tool Suite, including the data standard and dashboards, has gained significant momentum in K-12 education among state education agencies, school districts and vendors.  Eight states have licensed or are in discussions to license the Ed-Fi Tool Suite, and an additional four states will benefit from Ed-Fi-enabled tools through the Shared Learning Collaborative. This represents 34% of K-12 students and 36% of teachers across the United States. 

Ed-Fi is the only free, flexible and complete ed-tech solution to empower educators with relevant, timely, student-centric information that enables better data collection and reporting to improve decision making, facilitate targeted action plans and drive higher student outcomes. The Ed-Fi data standard aligns with Common Education Data Standards (CEDS) and facilitates secure data exchange among disparate data systems in the K-12 education sector. The Ed-Fi data standard enables interoperability among education systems that states and districts have already implemented, and enables organizations to build on prior investments in existing IT systems and processes. Most importantly, it puts the transformative power of information in the hands of teachers and other educators when and where they need it most: their classrooms.

Arizona, Kansas and New Mexico join Colorado, Delaware, Louisiana, Tennessee and Texasin using Ed-Fi to power their ongoing efforts to ensure that educators have the information and insight they need to understand the individual needs of every student and be equipped to respond.

Vendors including e-Scholar, Curriculum Associates, SunGard and Wireless Generation have also licensed Ed-Fi. Further, the Shared Learning Collaborative (SLC) has chosen Ed-Fi to power its scalable shared technology services, which aim to accelerate progress toward personalized learning for every K-12 student in the United States.  The SLC will help existing and future instructional technology investments in states, districts and schools work better together, and will extend the reach and potential of Ed-Fi to additional states including Illinois, Massachusetts, New York and North Carolina….

Ed-Fi does not replace existing education data or information systems, nor does it supplant existing data standards; it enables them to work together to give educators nationwide what they need: holistic portraits of students that are detailed, easy to understand and up-to-date at any given moment. Moreover, Ed-Fi addresses a long-standing challenge to meaningful systemic improvement in schools nationwide: The multiple and often non-interoperable information and education data systems used by schools, districts and states.

“Ed-Fi fills the persistent need in the education sector to harness the power of data already collected in school districts and states,” said Fey.

STATE EDUCATION AGENCY QUOTES

“Joining Ed-Fi and uniting behind a common data standard is an important step forward for Arizona’s education community to provide powerful student-level data to educators,” said Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal. “Arizona is undergoing transformative education reform, and improving the quality of education through sound data-driven decision making is a key part of that change. I applaud the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation for offering such a robust education technology solution, at no cost, to the Arizona Department of Education.”

“Colorado has consolidated 19 primary data collections, and we now have eight. We were able to do this by taking a student-based approach to data as compared to the old way of approaching data based on programs.  Ed-Fi wholly supports this enterprise view of data.  By streamlining the flow of information and eliminating redundant data requests, Colorado can reduce the data administration burden for schools while shifting resources towards using data to enhance performance,” said Robert Hammond, Commissioner of Education, Colorado.

“Use of the Ed-Fi standard allowed us to significantly accelerate the development life cycle for our Education Insight warehouse and dashboard projects, enabling us to move from analysis to production in just 12 months. Ed-Fi provided a compass that guided the transformation of data from a variety of disparate data sources into meaningful real-time metrics for classroom decision-making, while allowing us to customize the teacher dashboard to the specific needs of Delaware educators,” said Reese Robinson, Education Insight Project Manager, Delaware Department of Education….

About Ed-Fi

Ed-Fi is a universal educational data standard and tool suite that enables vital academic information on K-12 students to be consolidated from the different data systems of school districts throughout the United States. Ed-Fi acts as a universal translator of academic data, integrating and organizing information so that educators can start addressing the individual needs of each student from day one, and can measure progress and refine action plans throughout the school year.

Developed through funding from the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation, Ed-Fi licenses provide school districts, state education agencies and vendors with unrestricted access to all Ed-Fi components free of charge. For more information, visit www.ed-fi.org. The Ed-Fi initiative supports the goal of ensuring that all children have access to quality education in public schools, one of the foundation’s key objectives. http://www.educationnews.org/technology/ed-fi-signs-up-more-states-teachers-and-companies/

Schools also have to be concerned with student privacy rights.

Kelly Field reported in the Chronicle of Higher Education article, New Rules Would Allow for A Broader Sharing of Student Records

The Department of Education will release new rules today that will make it easier for states to develop data systems to track students’ academic progress and evaluate education programs.

The proposed new rules would allow high-school administrators and state officials to share student-level data with researchers, auditors, and other agencies without violating the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974, or Ferpa.

The changes are being welcomed by education reformers but criticized by privacy advocates, who fear they could undermine longstanding student protections. Under Ferpa, colleges must generally obtain a student’s consent to release data from an education record.

In an effort to strike a balance between privacy and accountability, the department has hired a chief privacy officer and created a technical-assistance center to advise states, schools, and colleges on privacy and data security.

But critics of the rule say such efforts won’t do enough to protect students in the face of expanded data-sharing.

The U.S. Department of Education has a site about the Family Education Act and Privacy

GENERAL
Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)

Family Policy Compliance Office (FPCO) Home

The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) (20 U.S.C. § 1232g; 34 CFR Part 99) is a Federal law that protects the privacy of student education records. The law applies to all schools that receive funds under an applicable program of the U.S. Department of Education.

For additional information, you may call 1-800-USA-LEARN (1-800-872-5327) (voice). Individuals who use TDD may call 1-800-437-0833.

Or you may contact us at the following address:

Family Policy Compliance Office
U.S. Department of Education
400 Maryland Avenue, SW
Washington, D.C. 20202-8520

Although, the database may make accessing student information easier, student privacy concerns should also be addressed.

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After the Bell Curve: Research starts the conversation about IQ, again

13 May

Human Intelligence has a very good summary of the Bell Curve book:

The Bell Curve, published in 1994, was written by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray as a work designed to explain, using empirical statistical analysis, the variations in intelligence in American Society, raise some warnings regarding the consequences of this intelligence gap, and propose national social policy with the goal of mitigating the worst of the consequences attributed to this intelligence gap. Many of the assertions put forth and conclusions reached by the authors are very controversial, ranging from the relationships between low measured intelligence and anti-social behavior, to the observed relationship between low African-American test scores (compared to whites and Asians) and genetic factors in intelligence abilities. The book was released and received with a large public response. In the first several months of its release, 400,000 copies of the book were sold around the world. Several thousand reviews and commentaries have been written in the short time since the book’s publication….

The Bell Curve, in its introduction, begins with a brief description of the history of intelligence theory and recent developments in intelligence thought and testing, through the eyes of the authors. The introduction concludes with six important assumptions that the authors build much of the Bell Curve’s case upon. These six assumptions regarding the validity of “classical” cognitive testing techniques include:

There is such a difference as a general factor of cognitive ability on which human beings differ.

All standardized test of academic aptitude or achievement measure this general factor to some degree, but IQ tests expressly designed for that purpose measure it most accurately.

IQ scores match, to a first degree, whatever it is that people mean when they use the word intelligent, or smart in ordinary language.

IQ scores are stable, although not perfectly so, over much of a person’s life.

Properly administered IQ tests are not demonstrably biased against social, economic, ethnic, or racial groups.

Cognitive ability is substantially heritable, apparently no less than 40 percent and no more than 80 percent.

The authors proceed to explain, using classical cognitive test results primarily, to explain how lower levels of measured intelligence impact an individual’s, or indeed an entire class or group of individual’s life in American society. The rest of the book is divided into four major parts. http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/bellcurve.shtml

Needless to say, this book ignited a firestorm.

Cam Soucy has written an excellent summary of IQ tests for the Livestrong site in the article, What Is the Definition of IQ Test?

History

French psychologist Alfred Binet developed the the first IQ-style tests at the beginning of the 20th century. The first tests were designed only to assess the intelligence of children. The U.S. military relied on intelligence testing to assess and place recruits during World Wars I and II. Psychologist David Wechsler used the military IQ tests as a model in devising his own test in 1949. Today, a group of tests derived from Wechsler’s work are the most widely used IQ tests.

Download Free White Paper on assessment and teaching from CTB/McGraw-Hill CTB.com

The fourth version of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, the WISC-IV, was released in 2009. A companion test, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale, targets people 16 and older. Other frequently used IQ tests include the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale, the Das-Naglieri Cognitive Assessment System and the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children.

Elements

IQ tests commonly assess the taker’s logical reasoning, math ability, spatial-relations skills, short-term memory and problem-solving skills.

Scoring

IQ tests originally were scored by dividing the subject’s “mental age,” as determined by which questions she answered correctly on the test, by her “chronological age,” her actual age in years, then multiplying that quotient by 100. For example, an 8-year-old child with a mental age of 12 would have an IQ of 125, with the calculation being 12/8 = 1.25, and 1.25 x 100 = 125. A person whose mental age precisely matched his actual age would have an IQ of 100, so a 100 IQ was defined as “average.”
Modern IQ tests no longer use such a formula. They simply compare a person’s test results with those of everyone else in the same age group, on a scale where 100 is defined as average intelligence.

Criticism

Criticism of IQ tests focuses on the content of the tests–that is, the type of questions they ask–and their application. Such areas as vocabulary and “logic” can be strongly influenced by culture and socioeconomics. For example, consider a test that asks what word goes best with “cup”: saucer, plate or bowl. The test may intend “saucer” to be the correct answer. However, a test-taker who grew up in a home where tables weren’t set in a formal fashion might not know what a saucer is. He may be just as “intelligent” as the next person, but his score will suffer because of cultural factors. Authors of IQ tests are continually refining tests to address such concerns; some tests have removed verbal elements entirely.
Even test creators argue that the results are only one tool for assessing a person’s abilities, and that “intelligence” in a person is not a fixed quality, but changeable–even from day to day. In reality, however, people and institutions tend to put great weight on IQ scores. Students have been labeled “learning disabled” based on the outcome of IQ tests alone. As authors revise their tests, they also are revising their instructions to stress the tests’ limited application

http://www.livestrong.com/article/130019-definition-iq-test/

Daniel Willingham, cognitive scientist and a psychology professor at the University of Virginia and author of “Why Don’t Students Like School?” His next book, “When Can You Trust The Experts? How to tell good science from bad in education,” will be published in July. He is written an interesting summary of his latest IQ study for the Washington Post.

In IQ: Willingham on the newest thinking, Willingham makes the following comments:

The American Psychological Association created a panel of eminent researchers to write a summary of what was known about intelligence, which would presumably contradict many of these claims. The panel published the article in 1996, a thoughtful rebuttal of many of the inaccurate claims in “The Bell Curve,” but also a very useful summary of what some of the best researchers in the field could agree on when it came to intelligence.

Now there’s an update. A group of eminent scientists thought the time was ripe to provide the field with another status-of-the-field statement. They argue that there have been three big changes in the 15 years since the last report:

(1) we know much more about the biology underlying intelligence; (2) we have a much better understanding of the impact of the environment on intelligence, and that impact is larger than was suspected; (3) we have a better understanding of how genes and the environment interact.

Some of the broad conclusions are listed below (note that these are close paraphrases of the article’s abstract).

The extent to which genes matter to intelligence varies by social class (genetic inheritance matters more if you’re wealthy, less if you’re poor).

Almost no genetic polymorphisms have been discovered that are consistently associated with variation of IQ in the normal range. “Crystallized” and “fluid” intelligence are different, both behaviorally and biologically.

The importance of the environment for IQ is established by the 12 to 18 point increase in IQ observed when children are adopted from working-class to middle-class homes. In most developed countries studied, gains on IQ tests have continued, and they are beginning in the developing world Sex differences in some aspects of intelligence are due partly to biological factors and partly to socialization factors. The IQ gap between blacks and whites in the United States has been reduced by 0.33 standard deviations in recent years.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/iq-willingham-on-the-newest-thinking/2012/05/12/gIQAB9J9JU_blog.html

Here is the citation and abstract of the work Willingham is commenting about:

Nisbett, R. E., Aronson, J., Blair, C., Dickens, W., Flynn, J., Halpern, D. F., & Turkheimer, E.

(2012, January 2). Intelligence: New Findings and Theoretical Developments. American Psychologist. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1037/a0026699

http://scottbarrykaufman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Nisbett-et-al.-2012.pdf

We review new findings and new theoretical developmentsin the field of intelligence. New findings include the following:

(a) Heritability of IQ varies significantly by social class. (b) Almost no genetic polymorphisms have been discovered that are consistently associated with variation in IQ in the normal range. (c) Much has been learned about the biological underpinnings of intelligence. (d) “Crystallized” and “fluid” IQ are quite different aspects of intelligence at both the behavioral and biological levels. (e) The importance of the environment for IQ is established by the 12-point to 18-point increase in IQ when children are adopted from working-class to middle-class homes. (f) Even when improvements in IQ produced by the most effective early childhood interventions fail to persist, there can be very marked effects on academic achievement and life outcomes. (g) In most developed countries studied,gains on IQ tests have continued, and they are beginning in the developing world. (h) Sex differences in aspects of intelligence are due partly to identifiable biological factors and partly to socialization factors. (i) The IQ gap between Blacks and Whites has been reduced by 0.33 SD in recent years. We report theorizing concerning (a) the relationship between working memory and intelligence, (b) the apparent contradiction between strong heritability effects on IQ and strong secular effects on IQ, (c) whether a general intelligence factor could arise from initially largely independent cognitive skills, (d) the relation between self-regulation and cognitive skills, and (e) the effects of stress on intelligence.

Here are some key findings of the study which deal directly with the Bell Curve:

Stress, Intelligence, and Social Class

One factor that Neisser and colleagues (1996) did not deal with extensively is stress. Chronic, continuous stress—what can be considered as “toxic” stress—is injurious over time to organ systems, including the brain. Chronically high levels of stress hormones damage specific areas of the brain—namely, the neural circuitry of PFC and hippocampus—that are important for regulating attention and for short-term memory, long-term memory, and working memory (McEwen, 2000). Although the extent to which the effect of early stress on brain development and stress physiology may affect the development of intelligence is not currently known, we do know that (a) stress is greater in low-income home environments (Evans, 2004) and (b) a low level of stress is important for self-regulation and early learning in school (Blair & Razza, 2007; Ferrer & McArdle, 2004; Ferrer et al., 2007). Research suggests that part of the Black–White IQ gap may be attributable to the fact that Blacks, on average, tend to live in more stressful environments than do Whites. This is particularly the case in urban environments, where Black children are exposed to multiple stressors. Sharkey (2010), for example, has recently found that Black children living in Chicago (ages 5–17) scored between 0.5 and 0.66 SD worse on tests (both the WISC-Revised and the Wide Range Achievement Test-3) in the aftermath of a homicide in their neighborhood. Sharkey’s data show that debilitating effects were evident among children regardless of whether they were witnesses to the homicide or had simply heard about it. An impressive study by Eccleston (2011) indicates that even stress on the pregnant mother may have enduring effects on her children. The children born to women in New York City who were in the first six months of pregnancy when 9/11 occurred had lower birth weights than children born before 9/11 or well after it, and the boys at the age of six were more than 7% more likely to be in special education and more than 15% more likely to be in kindergarten rather than first grade. Oddly, girls’ academic status was unaffected by mothers’ stress. Investigation of relations between early stress and intelligence thus seems an important direction for future research. A particularly important issue concerns the degree to which the effects of stress on the brain are reversible. These five unresolved issues are merely examples of some of the important contemporary paradoxes and unknowns in intelligence research. It is to be hoped that as much progress on these and other issues will be made in the next 15 years as has been made on some of the paradoxes and unknowns since the time of the Neisser et al. (1996) review.

IQ is not a simple concept and this newest research points to more questions than answers.

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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The Healthy Schools Coalition fights for school-based efforts to combat obesity

12 May

In Childhood obesity: Recess is being cut in low-income schools moi said:

The goal of this society should be to raise healthy and happy children who will grow into concerned and involved adults who care about their fellow citizens and environment. In order to accomplish this goal, all children must receive a good basic education and in order to achieve that goal, children must arrive at school, ready to learn. There is an epidemic of childhood obesity and obesity is often prevalent among poor children. The American HeartAssociation has some great information about Physical Activity and Children http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/GettingHealthy/Physical-Activity-and-Children_UCM_304053_Article.jsp#.TummU1bfW-c

Unfortunately, many low-income children are having access to physical activities at school reduced because of the current recession.

Sandy Slater is reporting in the Education Nation article, Low-Income Schools Are Less Likely to Have Daily Recess

Here’s what we know:

• Children aged six to 17 should get at least one hour of daily physical activity, yet less than half of kids aged six to 11 get that much exercise. And as kids get older, they’re even less active.

• The National Association of Sport and Physical Education (NASPE) recommends that elementary school students get an average of 50 minutes of activity each school day – at least 150 minutes of PE per week and 20 minutes of daily recess.

• Kids who are more active perform better academically.

As a researcher and a parent, I’m very interested in improving our understanding of how school policies and practices impact kids’ opportunities to be active at school. My colleagues and I recently conducted a study to examine the impact of state laws and school district policies on PE and recess in public elementary schools across the country.

During the 2006 to 2007 and 2008 to 2009 school years, we received surveys from 1,761 school principals in 47 states. We found:

• On average, less than one in five schools offered 150 minutes of PE per week.

• Schools in states with policies that encouraged daily recess were more likely to offer third grade students the recommended 20 minutes of recess daily.

• Schools serving more children at highest risk for obesity (i.e. black and Latino children and those from lower-income families) were less likely to have daily recess than were schools serving predominantly white students and higher-income students.

• Schools that offered 150 minutes of weekly PE were less likely also to offer 20 minutes of daily recess, and vice versa. This suggests that schools are substituting one opportunity for another instead of providing the recommended amount of both.

• Schools with a longer day were more likely to meet the national recommendations for both PE and recess.

http://www.educationnation.com/index.cfm?objectid=ACF23D1E-229A-11E1-A9BF000C296BA163&aka=0

The gap between the wealthiest and the majority is society is also showing up in education opportunities and access to basic health care. https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2011/12/15/childhood-obesity-recess-is-being-cut-in-low-income-schools/

Susan Heavey of Reuters in reporting in the article, Childhood Obesity Target Of Campaign Urging U.S. Government To Improve School Resources For Healthy Students, which was posted at Huffington Post:

A coalition of health advocacy groups on Wednesday urged the U.S. government to put more resources into school-based efforts to improve health and fight obesity among youth.

The recommendations by the Healthy Schools Campaign and Trust for America’s Health were backed by more than 70 groups including the American Cancer Society and the National Education Association.

In a report, they urged the Department of Education to offer grants to promote healthy living initiatives, fund staff training to include wellness programs, support school efforts aimed at nutrition and exercise and track results of such programs.

“The link between health and learning is clear. Healthy, active and well-nourished children are more likely to attend school, be engaged, and be ready to learn. Often, however, the school setting does not support health,” the two nonprofit groups said in their report.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan said data linking health and academic success is compelling and that schools must think creatively to work wellness into a variety of subjects.

“When you do things well, children are successful,” he said at an event to release the proposal at the National Press Club. But when they don’t get a chance to be active or are hungry “bad things happen to them.”

The proposal follows findings released earlier this week that the number of obese Americans is expected to soar without dramatic changes. More than 40 percent of U.S. adults are expected to be obese by 2030, according to a government-funded study released on Monday.

Because obesity is increasingly starting earlier in life, experts see reaching kids and teaching them healthy habits as a key step to stemming American’s growing waistline. One-third of children aged 2 to 19 are overweight or obese, statistics show.

An effort needs to be made now, the groups urged, and could be done with current Education Department funding and authority.

They said wellness should not be “relegated to an occasional health lesson or physical education class – it is part of math, science, lunch and everything in between.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/09/us-government-urged-to-fi_n_1504319.html?ref=email_share

See, Groups Offer Ways for Feds to Improve Student Well-Being http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2012/05/11/31health.h31.html?tkn=VMSF8T%2BwDBQibjzZZ5JDJIRUzSoPPMTtAHvA&intc=es

The Healthy Schools Campaign works with a number of organizations. According to their site:

Health in Mind is based on a vision statement for healthy students and healthy schools. More than 70 organizations representing the nation’s education and health stakeholders have signed on to this vision. We invite you to view a list of organizations that have signed on to the Health in Mind vision here.

Their press release describes their recommendations.

Here is the press release from the Healthy Schools Campaign:

Press Release

Contact: Brittany Wright, Media and Outreach Specialist
Office: (312) 419-1810 / Mobile: (312) 560-7833
brittany@healthyschoolscampaign.org

Education and Public Health Research and Advocacy Organizations Present Secretaries Duncan and Sebelius with Recommendations to Close the Achievement Gap by Addressing School Health
Health in Mind Spotlights Actionable Solutions to Urgent Education and Health Challenges

Washington, D.C., MAY 9, 2012 – Healthy Schools Campaign (HSC) and Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) today released actionable policy recommendations focused on supporting schools in addressing health and wellness in order to improve student learning and achievement. The recommendations were presented to U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius.

“Healthy students are better prepared to learn and succeed in school,” said Rochelle Davis, President and CEO of HSC, a national advocacy organization that focuses much of its work on improving the food and fitness environment in Chicago schools. “An increasing body of research backs up this common-sense notion. This is especially critical in light of the vast health disparities that exist in our nation. Unless we address health and wellness in schools, our nation’s efforts to close the achievement gap will be compromised.”

The recommendations, Health in Mind, note that incorporating health and wellness into school culture and environment, student services and curricula can support student health, help close the achievement gap and ensure this generation does not become the first in American history to live shorter, less healthy lives than their parents.

Two years ago, the Affordable Care Act created the National Prevention and Health Promotion Council (NPC), which brought together 17 federal cabinet agencies and offices from across the government to address prevention. The NPC released the National Prevention Strategy, which commits the entire federal government, not just the health agencies, to integrating health into their work.

“T he Strategy and these recommendations represent a major culture shift in how the nation views health – health will no longer be separated from education, transportation, housing and other clearly connected policies,” said Jeff Levi, executive director of TFAH and Chair of the Advisory Group on Prevention, Health Promotion, and Integrative and Public Health. “Health in Mind’s focus on students and schools promises to have a long-term payoff by improving education and the quality of life for today’s kids as they grow up – they will do better in school and be healthier.”

Health in Mind focuses on several federal initiatives and policies that can broadly benefit the health, well-being and education of the nation’s students. Some of the recommendations include:

  • Prepare principals and teachers to promote student health and wellness through professional development programs and in-service training that equips them to identify and address student health issues while creating classroom and school environments that support all students’ wellness.
  • Provide schools with strategies to partner with parents as agents of change for integrating health and wellness into education.
  • Incorporate health and wellness into school metrics and accountability systems to allow schools to make data-driven decisions about how health and wellness impact student learning.
  • Incorporate health and wellness into recognition programs to motivate schools to adopt policies and practices that promote student health and wellness.
  • Increase the Department of Education’s capacity to provide leadership and guidance on integrating health and wellness into schools as a way to improve academic performance.
  • Reduce barriers that schools face when seeking reimbursement for health services delivered to Medicaid-eligible students, providing a level of funding that can increase access to health and prevention services, particularly through school nursing.
  • Re-think the role schools can play in our nation’s prevention efforts and the ways that the Department of Health and Human Services can support schools in creating the conditions for health.

“Together, we can create the conditions for health and well-being in our nation’s schools,” said Gail Christopher, vice president – program strategy for the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, a partner and funder of this work. “Implementing these recommendations can build on existing momentum and accomplish meaningful change that shapes children’s health and learning for a lifetime.”

At the presentation of recommendations, union leaders representing the nation’s teachers voiced support for prioritizing health in schools.

“The link between student health and student achievement is not theoretical—it is a fact.” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers. “Yes, there are many educational and academic issues that we need to address. But making schools better also means that we must create environments that provide steady support for health and good nutrition.”

“Our members work with students every day whose health and school conditions impede their ability to learn,” said National Education Association President Dennis Van Roekel. “That’s why NEA members are taking the lead to advocate for school and learning conditions that result in a higher level of student engagement and fewer absences.”

More than 70 organizations signed on to the Health in Mind vision statement also presented at the briefing.

For more information or to view the full recommendations please visit http://www.healthyschoolscampaign.org/healthinmind .

Welcome

http://www.healthyschoolscampaign.org/getinvolved/action/healthinmind/release.php

Moi said in Race, class, and education in America:

Many educators have long recognized that the impact of social class affects both education achievement and life chances after completion of education. There are two impacts from diversity, one is to broaden the life experience of the privileged and to raise the expectations of the disadvantaged. Social class matters in not only other societies, but this one as well.

A few years back, the New York Times did a series about social class in America. That series is still relevant. Janny Scott and David Leonhardt’s overview, Shadowy Lines That Still Divide describes the challenges faced by schools trying to overcome the disparity in education. The complete series can be found at Social Class

https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2011/11/07/race-class-and-education-in-america/

To quote Yogi Berra, ” It’s deja vu all over again“

Related:

Louisiana study: Fit children score higher on standardized tests https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/05/08/louisiana-study-fit-children-score-higher-on-standardized-tests/

School dinner programs: Trying to reduce the number of hungry children                                                                 https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/01/28/school-dinner-programs-trying-to-reduce-the-number-of-hungry-children/

Children, body image, bullying, and eating disorders https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/01/09/children-body-image-bullying-and-eating-disorders/

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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Study: When teachers overcompensate for prejudice

10 May

In Harlem movie and the hard question: Does indigenous African-American culture support academic success? https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/01/08/harlem-movie-and-the-hard-question-does-indigenous-african-american-culture-support-academic-success/ Moi discussed some of the cultural challenges faced by African-American students. People want an education for a variety of reasons. Some have a love of learning. Others want to attend a good college or vocational school. Still others, see an education as a ticket to a good job. Increasingly for schools, the goal is to prepare kids with the skills to attend and succeed at college. In order to give children the skills to succeed, schools need teachers who are effective at educating their population of kids. There are many themes in the attempt to answer the question, what will prepare kids for what comes after high school. What will prepare kids for what comes after high school is a good basic education. The schools that provide a good basic education are relentless about the basics.

If everything works well in a classroom, the children arrive ready to learn and the teacher has deep subject matter knowledge, which is transmitted to the students. The intangibles are how the knowledge is transmitted and what affects knowledge transmission. Research regarding the halo effect may indicate that transmission of knowledge can be affected by student perceptions.

The ‘halo effect’ is a classic finding in social psychology. It is the idea that global evaluations about a person (e.g. she is likeable) bleed over into judgments about their specific traits (e.g. she is intelligent). Hollywood stars demonstrate the halo effect perfectly. Because they are often attractive and likeable we naturally assume they are also intelligent, friendly, display good judgment and so on. That is, until we come across (sometimes plentiful) evidence to the contrary. 

John Nisbett and others wrote the original halo effect study Evidence for Unconscious Alterations of Judgments If the goal is to model behaviors and impart skills which allow children the optimum number of life choices, what does modeling a tongue stud represent?

Brian Resnick has written an intriguing article for National Journal, When Teachers Overcompensate for Racial Prejudice:

The performance gap between white and minority students is one of the most persisting problems in American education. Since the 1990s, the performance gap, as reported by the National Assessment of Educational Progress, has more or less stagnated. While a multitude of factors contribute to the disparity — most glaringly the quality of instruction in poorly funded schools — there are some underlying psychological factors as well.

One widely documented phenomenon is called stereotype threat: When confronted with a racial bias (for example, a suggestion that black students do not perform well on a task), stereotyped students actually don’t do as well compared to control groups. This, in part, explains why black students may not perform as well on high-stakes tests such as the SATs. Some studies have even shown that the threat can diminish short-term memory.

Another psychological roadblock, as outlined in a recent study in the Journal of Educational Psychology, is a tendency for white teachers to judge minority students’ work less critically than white students’. 

It’s called positive feedback bias, but its effects are largely negative. “There’s nothing wrong with getting positive feedback,” says Kent Harber, lead researcher of the study. But “what happens is that when the feedback is inaccurate, it doesn’t provide a valid fix as to where a student is actually performing. Then they don’t know where they need to best direct their efforts. It’s like having a biased compass.”

Furthermore, the minority students are implicitly aware that this is happening, which increases their distrust of their white teachers and fuels disinterest in schoolwork. 

“When black students get positive feedback from a white, and they believe that the white is aware of their race, not only does their self esteem not get bolstered by the positive feedback — it is actually depressed,” Harber says.

In the study, 126 teachers from the New York metropolitan area were asked to edit essays supposedly written by a black, Latino, or white student. They weren’t told the the student’s racial demographics, but the researchers provided students’ names that hinted at it (Taisha or Jarell for black students, Mark or Molly for white students). The teachers were told their comments would be delivered back to the students. In actuality, there were no students and the essays were assembled to mimic a C-grade level ability.

The researchers found that the teachers were indeed not grading the black and Latino students as critically as the white ones. This trend has been documented before, but the deeper question Harber and his colleagues were trying to answer was the source of the teacher’s motivation. What compelled them to be less critical of minority students?

Political correctness is often seen as an effort to keep up appearances, but Harber’s group found that something different was going on here. The teachers were trying to preserve a self image of being unbiased. The research group came to this conclusion this because the teachers didn’t show bias toward the objective aspects of the essay — the grammar or the spelling — but rather the subjective aspects like ideas and logic. And as the paper states, “criticizing subjective features of writing raises the risk of appearing unfair because there are few established standards to justifying such criticism.”

“There might be multiple causes [for positive feedback bias], but the one that seems particularly potent is a self-image concern, that the whites don’t want to see themselves as prejudiced, independent of how other people see them,” Harber says. “What happens, I believe, is their focus gets distracted from what are the needs of the students to what are ways that I can restore my self image.”

So how can this problem be solved? Harber and his colleagues found that teachers who have greater social support at school are less likely to show a positive feedback bias toward black students. The theory is that teachers with support feel less anxious about their performance and can concentrate on being fair graders.

http://news.yahoo.com/teachers-overcompensate-racial-prejudice-161229821.html;_ylc=X3oDMTNsMnZqdms3BF9TAzk3NDc2MTc1BGFjdANtYWlsX2NiBGN0A2EEaW50bAN1cwRsYW5nA2VuLVVTBHBrZwNkYWZkODM5NS04YjNkLTM4OTYtYTYyZC1mYzUyNGE0MTRiY2MEc2VjA21pdF9zaGFyZQRzbGsDbWFpbAR0ZXN0Aw&#8211;;_ylv=3

Citation:

Database: PsycARTICLES

[ First Posting ]

Students’ Race and Teachers’ Social Support Affect the Positive Feedback Bias in Public Schools.

Harber, Kent D.; Gorman, Jamie L.; Gengaro, Frank P.; Butisingh, Samantha; Tsang, William; Ouellette, Rebecca

Journal of Educational Psychology, Apr 30 , 2012, No Pagination Specified. doi: 10.1037/a0028110

Abstract

  1. This research tested whether public school teachers display the positive feedback bias, wherein Whites give more praise and less criticism to minorities than to fellow Whites for equivalent work. It also tested whether teachers lacking in school-based social support (i.e., support from fellow teachers and school administrators) are more likely to display the positive bias and whether the positive feedback bias applies to Latinos as well as to Blacks. White middle school and high school teachers from 2 demographically distinct public school districts gave feedback on a poorly written essay supposedly authored by a Black, Latino, or White student. Teachers in the Black student condition showed the positive bias, but only if they lacked school-based social support. Teachers in the Latino student condition showed the positive bias regardless of school-based support. These results indicate that the positive feedback bias may contribute to the insufficient challenge that undermines minority students’ academic achievement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

There are many causes for the disparity in education outcome for many children of color. Along with family situation, low-income status, low-performing schools, and cultural norms, more attention must be paid to the expectation of teachers regarding children who they judge as not likely to succeed.

Related:

Who says Black children can’t learn? Some schools get it https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2012/03/22/who-says-black-children-cant-learn-some-schools-gets-it/

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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