Tag Archives: Schott Foundation for Public Education

A possible model for corporate involvement in the inner city: GM and Detroit

8 Aug

Carolee Adams reported in the Education Week article, Internship Pairs Detroit Students With GM Retirees:

The Cody team is one of 11 in the Student Corps in what started as a summer employment program, but morphed into a comprehensive experience that combines service, life-skills education, and mentoring. All told, 110 high school students, 60 retirees, and 12 college interns are involved in this, its first year. Since 2010, when the GM Foundation gave $27 million to the United Way to create “networks of excellence” in a handful of high-need area schools, company liaisons have been working with students. Last fall, the idea of a summer internship program emerged.
GM retirees, who oversee the teams, give encouragement to students who are growing up in a city that just filed for bankruptcy, where many grocery stores have bars on the windows, unemployment is higher than the national average at 16.3 percent, and about one-third of the population lives below the poverty line.
“It’s not like this everywhere,” Mr. Wright told his charges in a mentoring session during lunch. “Until you see something different [from Detroit], that’s the way you think it is.”
Broad Exposure
Company officials wanted to do more for schools than write a check. So they turned to Mike DiGiovanni, 65, a retired GM executive, and asked him to become the director of the Student Corps and recruit fellow retirees.
“Our program is unique because it’s not just putting kids to work, it’s teaching them about life,” said Mr. DiGiovanni “It’s giving them a paid internship and GM on their résumé to set them up for life. This is about exposing them to the skills and education they need to succeed in life.”
The retirees wanted the summer to be about more than cleaning up parks. The organizers soon realized the breadth of retiree talent and considered how to fill rainy days with activities, said Heidi Magyar, the manager of Student Corps. Also, the company had miscalculated the caliber of the students—most have aspirations to go to college—so the program expanded in response.
“These kids have grit. They are determined to be successful in life,” said Mr. DiGiovanni. “Their need and drive was way beyond what we anticipated.”
Research solidly shows that having a mentor can help students from disadvantaged backgrounds who often don’t have the support system and social capital needed to make it in college, said David Conley, the director of the Center for Educational Policy
Research at the University of Oregon, in Eugene. Mentors “take something that is abstract and make it real,” he said.
The transition process from high school to college is far more complex and demanding than most schools acknowledge, said Mr. Conley. In these kinds of programs, students learn skills that help them feel more in control of their lives, which is a huge step in the process of getting ready for college, Mr. Conley said…..http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2013/08/07/37career.h32.html?tkn=ZRSF2oKy2uM74XRBHRHnMIyyPZ0JBSHWUR4u&cmp=clp-edweek&intc=es

The GM program is not only an example of corporate involvement, but it provides mentors and guidance to children who may be at-risk.

One of the mantras of this blog is that education is a partnership between the student, parent(s) or guardian(s), teacher(s), and the school. All parts of the partnership must be involved.
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. Two key segments of this society are not as successful as other parts of society in high school graduation rates. The Schott Foundation released the study, The Urgency of Now: The Schott 50 State Report on Public Education and Black Male. Learn more at: http://www.schottfoundation.org and http://blackboysreport.org/
So, the question becomes how to give children the values that they might receive if they were in a healthy family. Youth Guidance, is another program which attempts to meet that need with the “Becoming A Man” program.

Youth Guidance describes “Becoming a Man” (BAM):

Youth Guidance’s B.A.M. (Becoming A Man™) – Sports Edition is a school-based counseling, mentoring, violence prevention and educational enrichment program that promotes social, emotional and behavioral competencies in at-risk male youth. B.A.M – Sports Edition’s curriculum addresses six core values: integrity, accountability, self-determination, positive anger expression, visionary goal-setting and respect for women, as each value relates to personal and academic success.
B.A.M. – Sports Edition addresses key challenges African-American and Latino youth confront daily in some of Chicago’s toughest communities.B.A.M. – Sports Edition focuses exclusively on males because they are vastly more likely than females to be either victims or perpetrators of violent crime. Youth Guidance’s Anthony DiVittorio, L.C.P.C. created B.A.M. in response to an observation that his male students often lacked physical and emotional access to their fathers or other positive male role models. DiVittorio designed the B.A.M. curriculum around an innovative application of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) techniques, resiliency theory and rites of passage “men’s work” that have been demonstrated to successfully help youth improve self-regulation, social skills, and interpersonal skills.B.A.M. is invested in helping youth improve life-long protective factors and reduce behavioral risk factors.
Over the course of 30 weekly sessions, B.A.M. – Sports Edition participants engage in developmentally-based lessons and challenges that promote their emotional literacy, impulse-control, social competence, positive peer relations and interpersonal problems-solving skills. B.A.M. – Sports Editionis designed to help students pass classes, reduce both in-school and out of school suspensions, reduce detentions, increase school attendance, reduce disciplinary problems, and support grade promotion.
Results of the study released in 2012 show that B.A.M. works and is cost-effective. Program participants saw a 10 percent increase in graduation rates, a reduction in failing grades by 37 percent, and a decrease in violent crime arrests by 44 percent. At a cost of $1,100 per participant, the Crime Lab estimates the social benefit/cost ratio to be at least 3:1 per participating youth.
“The University of Chicago Crime Lab study shows that Youth Guidance’s B.A.M. program reduces youth violence, increases school achievement and helps Chicago’s young men reach their full potential. ‘Becoming a Man’ helps young men find evidence of their worth, strengthen their connection to and success in school, and help build safer communities,” stated Youth Guidance’s CEO Michelle Morrison.
B.A.M.’s curriculum is built on six B.A.M. Core Values
Here are the BAM Core Values:
1.INTEGRITY – is the core principle of the program. Students learn to identify and respect societal values and to conduct themselves in accordance with those values. Students learn that a man’s word should have meaning, and that a man’s integrity is dependent on keeping his word. Students learn that a man is someone who is reliable, honest and in touch with his integrity or lack thereof. He makes amends when he is out of integrity, and does what he says he is going to do.
2. ACCOUNTABILITY – Students learn that they should be responsible for the choices that they make and take ownership for their feelings, thoughts and behaviors. Students learn that a man does not project, or put blame onto others for the consequences of his own bad choices. A man can feel anger, sadness or fear, but he must own his reactions to those emotions.
3. SELF-DETERMINATION – is a learned skill, and practice begins in B.A.M. group. Students learn the importance of focus and perseverance in reaching one’s goals. Students learn to deal with self-defeating feelings, thoughts and behaviors that can become obstacles or barriers to goal-attainment. Students learn that self-doubt, uncertainty, and moments of weakness are natural when attempting to reach a goal.
4.POSITIVE ANGER EXPRESSION – is the most effective and remembered lesson taught in the program. Students learn that anger is a normal emotion that can be expressed in a constructive manner. This skill allows for the alleviation of angry feelings and becomes a bridge to goal attainment. Students learn anger management coping skills such as deep breathing exercises to elicit a relaxation response. Students learn effective techniques to express anger that avoid typical negative consequences (i.e. suspensions, arrests, damaged relationships, etc.).
5.VISIONARY GOAL SETTING – Students learn the difference between short-term and long-term goals and how to create realistic steps toward goal attainment. Students learn to envision their manhood in the future and to make clear connections between their current behaviors, attitudes and values and their vision. During this intense phase, students aim to get in touch with traumas, pains and faulty thinking that cause them to act in negative, destructive manners. They learn how to heal these parts of themselves and to use the energy toward attaining their vision. Not all students are ready for this phase of the program. However, it can be a life altering phase for those who are.
6. RESPECT FOR WOMANHOOD – Students go through three stages of learning. First, there are lectures and discussions around the history and contemporary roles that women have held in society. Students are challenged to take a critical look at which norms represent positive value and appreciation as opposed to depreciation, devaluing and oppression. Second, students learn concrete positive communication skills and begin using them during their interactions. As a result, students enter the final stage of training, wherein they increase their value and appreciation of womanhood.
B.A.M. – Sports Edition places special emphasis on issues surrounding respect and integrity. This value reinforces those important messages at a deeper level.

See, Therapy Helps Troubled Teens Rethink Crime http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/07/02/188646607/therapy-helps-troubled-teens-rethink-crime?utm_medium=Email&utm_source=share&utm_campaign=

It is going to take coordination between not only education institutions, but a strong social support system to get many of these children through school. This does not mean a large program directed from Washington. But, more resources at the local school level which allow discretion with accountability. For example, if I child is not coming to school because they have no shoes or winter coat, then the child gets new shoes and/or a coat. School breakfast and lunch programs must be supported and if necessary, expanded. Unfortunately, schools are now the early warning system for many families in crisis. In addition, to families and schools, corporate support can be useful in helping to move at-risk children into the mainstream.

Related:

‘Becoming A Man’ course: Helping young African-American men avoid prison

‘Becoming A Man’ course: Helping young African-American men avoid prison

Study: The plight of African-American boys in Oakland, California

Study: The plight of African-American boys in Oakland, California

Schott Foundation report: Black and Latino boys are not succeeding in high school
https://drwilda.com/tag/african-american-male/

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/

Jonathan Cohn’s ‘The Two Year Window’
https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2011/12/18/jonathan-cohns-the-two-year-window/

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

Inappropriate discipline: The first step on the road to education failure

Inappropriate discipline: The first step on the road to education failure

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Schott Foundation report: Black and Latino boys are not succeeding in high school

19 Sep

One of the mantras of this blog is that education is a partnership between the student, parent(s) or guardian(s), teacher(s), and the school. All parts of the partnership must be involved.

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. Two key segments of this society are not as successful as other parts of society in high school graduation rates. The Schott Foundation has released the study, The Urgency of Now: The Schott 50 State Report on Public Education and Black Male.

Here is the press release for The Urgency of Now: The Schott 50 State Report on Public Education and Black Male:

PRESS RELEASE

Embargoed for release: September 19, 2012

Contact: Andrew Sousa| (202) 265-5111 |andrews@globalpolicysolutions.com

Jocelyn Rousey| (617) 876-7700 |jr@schottfoundation.org

The report and state-specific data can be found here: www.blackboysreport.org

Schott Foundation: America’s Education System Neglects Almost Half of the Nation’s Black and Latino Male Students

New report cites need to address students being pushed out and locked out of opportunities to learn;

Schott Foundation joins call for a moratorium on out-of-school suspensions

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – A new report from the Schott Foundation for Public Education finds that only 52 percent of Black male and 58 percent of Latino male ninth-graders graduate from high school four years later, while 78 percent of White, non-Latino male ninth-graders graduate four years later. The report suggests that without a policy framework that creates opportunity for all students, strengthens supports for the teaching profession and strikes the right balance between support-based reforms and standards-driven reforms, the U.S. will become increasingly unequal and less competitive in the global economy.

According to The Urgency of Now: The Schott 50 State Report on Public Education and Black Males, the national graduation rate for Black males has increased by ten percentage points since 2001-02, with 2010-11 being the first year that more than half of the nation’s ninth-grade Black males graduated with a regular diploma four years later. Yet, this progress has closed the graduation gap between Black male and White, non-Latino males by only three percentage points. At this rate, it would take nearly 50 years for Black males to achieve the same high school graduation rates as their White male counterparts.

“We have a responsibility to provide future generations of Americans with the education and the skills needed to thrive in communities, the job market and the global economy. Yet, too many Black and Latino young boys and men are being pushed out and locked out of the U.S. education system or find themselves unable to compete in a 21st Century economy upon graduating,” said John H. Jackson, president and CEO of the Schott Foundation for Public Education. “These graduation rates are not indicative of a character flaw in the young men, but rather evidence of an unconscionable level of willful neglect, unequal resource allocation by federal, state and local entities and the indifference of too many elected and community leaders. It’s time for a support-based reform movement.”

Among the states with the largest Black enrollments, North Carolina (58%), Maryland (57%), and California (56%) have the highest graduation rates for Black males, while New York (37%), Illinois (47%) and Florida (47%) have the lowest. Arizona (84%) and Minnesota (65%) were the only states within the top ten ranked states, in graduation rates, with over 10,000 Black males enrolled. Among the states with the highest enrollments of Latinos, Arizona (68%), New Jersey (66%) and California (64%) have the highest graduation rates for Latino males, while New York (37%), Colorado (46%) and Georgia (52%) have the lowest.

Three of the four states with the highest graduation rates for Black males were states with a relatively small number of Black males enrolled in the state’s schools: Maine (97%), Vermont (82%), Utah (76%). This seems to indicate that Black males, on average, perform better in places and spaces where they are not relegated to under-resourced districts or schools. When provided similar opportunities they are more likely to produce similar or better outcomes as their White male peers.

The report cites the need to address what the Schott Foundation calls a “pushout” and “lockout” crisis in our education system, in part by reducing and reclaiming the number of students who are no longer in schools receiving critical educational services and improving the learning and transition opportunities for students who remain engaged. Blacks and Latinos face disproportionate rates of out-of-school suspensions and are not consistently receiving sufficient learning time – effectively being pushed out of opportunities to succeed. Many who remain in schools are locked out of systems with well-resourced schools and where teachers have the training, mentoring, administrative support, supplies and the facilities they need to provide our children with a substantive opportunity to learn.

In the foreword to the report, Andrés A. Alonso, CEO, Baltimore City Public Schools, described his city’s efforts to keep kids in schools: “We could not have made these strides without asserting unequivocally that we had no disposable children, and that we needed everyone’s help to make things right.” Alonzo concludes, “I am confident that we as a nation will rally and we will succeed. The cost of continued failure is around us, a disservice to our best hopes. The cost of continued failure should be abhorrent to contemplate.”

To cut down the alarming “pushout” rate, the Schott Foundation is supporting the recently launched Solutions Not Suspensions initiative, a grassroots effort of students, educators, parents and community leaders calling for a nationwide moratorium on out-of-school suspensions. The initiative, supported by The Opportunity to Learn Campaign and the Dignity in Schools Campaign, promotes proven programs that equip teachers and school administrators with effective alternatives to suspensions that keep young people in school and learning.

Schott also calls for students who are performing below grade level to receive “Personal Opportunity Plans” to prevent them from being locked out of receiving the resources needed to succeed. The report highlights the need to pivot from a standards-driven reform agenda to a supports-based reform agenda that provides all students equitable access to the resources critical to successfully achieving high standards.

The Urgency of Now also provides the following recommendations for improving graduation rates for young Black and Latino men:

• End the rampant use of out-of-school suspensions as a default disciplinary action, as it decreases valuable learning time for the most vulnerable students and increases dropouts.

• Expand learning time and increase opportunities for a well-rounded education including the arts, music, physical education, robotics, foreign language, and apprenticeships.

• States and cities should conduct a redlining analysis of school funding, both between and within districts, and work with the community and educators to develop a support-based reform plan with equitable resource distribution to implement sound community school models.

“There is no doubt that the stakes are high. Black and Latino children under the age of 18 will become a majority of all children in the U.S. by the end of the current decade, many of whom are in lower-income households located in neighborhoods with under-resourced schools,” said Michael Holzman, senior research consultant to the Schott Foundation. “We do not want our young Black and Latino men to have to beat the odds; we want to change the odds. We must focus on systemic change to provide all our children with the opportunity to learn.”

For the full report, The Urgency of Now: Schott 50 State Report on Public Education and Black Males,

including detailed state data, visit http://www.blackboysreport.org.

###

About The Schott Foundation for Public Education Founded in 1991, the Schott Foundation

for Public Education seeks to develop and strengthen a broad-based and representative movement to achieve fully resourced high quality preK-12 public education.

Learn more at: www.schottfoundation.org

http://blackboysreport.org/

Joy Moses has written the Center for American Progress report, Low-Income Fathers Need to Get Connected about the importance of making sure that low-income dads play a part in the lives of their children.

Low-income fathers should definitely be a part of the family policy equation. Men are able to financially contribute to their children’s well-being and help lift them out of poverty in the short term. They also provide care and emotional supports that can improve children’s life outcomes and help break the cycle of poverty in the long term.

Low-income fathers should definitely be a part of the family policy equation.

Unfortunately, far too many low-income men, and especially men of color, face barriers to playing these roles in their children’s lives. They are disproportionately disconnected from some extremely vital domains, and that harms them, their children, and families more generally.

These domains are examined in this paper and include:

  • Employment. Shifts in the economy have decreased low-skilled workers’ job opportunities and wages over the last couple of decades. This impairs some men’s ability to financially support their children and families. The related financial stress drives wedges between family members.
  • Society. More than 2 million people are in the nation’s prisons, and these are mostly low-income men. Their absence deprives children and families of income and emotional connections. And even after fathers are released, families continue to experience such negative consequences as income-impairing employment barriers linked to criminal records and reconnecting emotionally after a long period apart. Fathers are more likely to recidivate if family disconnections persist.
  • Housing. Housing is unaffordable to the lowest-income workers throughout the United States. Spending a disproportionate amount of income on housing depletes resources families have available for other needs associated with childrearing. Low-income families are also at risk of housing instability, which often physically divides families and harms their relationships with one another.

It’s clear that low-income children can’t afford it when their fathers experience these disconnections. Their mothers, who are low-income women, are the poorest of the poor and earn less than their male counterparts. Low-skilled African-American women and Latinas are at the absolute bottom of the economic ladder, with incomes that are less than similarly situated white females.

This means policies should seek to maximize the level of financial help fathers provide in addition to increasing women’s earnings and available work supports. Additional income from husbands, cohabiting fathers, or nonresident fathers via child support payments financially benefits children. And repairing men’s disconnections that impair their ability to provide care, love, and attention also benefits their children.

Download the full report (pdf)

Download the executive summary (pdf)

All anyone can say about this report to Ms. Moses is amen, sister.

We must encourage the formation of strong families and provide support to encourage the viability of families. This nation will not achieve the goal of successfully providing all children with a good basic education without the foundation of strong family support and that includes supporting the role of fathers in the upbringing and development of their children. There are some very uncomfortable conversations ahead for the African-American community about the high rate of unwed mothers, about the care of women during pregnancy, and about early childhood education in the homes of children. Most important, about the lack the active involvement of fathers of some children.

Time to start talking. The conversation is not going to get any less difficult.

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/

Jonathan Cohn’s ‘The Two Year Window’ https://drwilda.wordpress.com/2011/12/18/jonathan-cohns-the-two-year-window/

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

Inappropriate discipline: The first step on the road to education failure                                                                      https://drwilda.com/2011/12/13/inappropriate-discipline-the-first-step-on-the-road-to-education-failure/

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/

Dr. Wilda says this about that ©

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