Low achievement and poverty — they go together

Jesus was poor. He lived in a poverty-stricken area. The wealthy owners of all the land lived in distant cities. They hired thugs to recruit workers for the lowest wage possible. Jesus had no regard for the wealthy. His passion was the restoration of the poor to wholeness in the name of God, whom he called father. There is nothing in the life of Jesus that is better established than his commitment to the poor.

In early American history, Protestant Christians took on the responsibility of community-wide education for children. No mission was more strongly embraced by churches in early America than education.

Public education and commitment to the poor are the core concerns of the most recent edition of Sojourners magazine. The September/October 2012 edition carries a series of articles about the crisis in American public school education. This column has been inspired and informed by the Sojourner articles. The message needs to be shared.

No Child Left Behind has made America super conscious of test scores and achievement levels for children. Analysis is unending and proposals for improvement are abundant. In the process of implementation of NCLB, lots of finger pointing has taken place. Quality of teachers, pay for teachers, length of school day, class size, curriculum content and achievement expectations have all come under fire. To motivate teachers and schools toward higher test scores, monetary rewards have been given to high achieving schools. Schools with low levels of achievement have been penalized. The projected improvements are not happening. Why?

Some correlations of low achievement levels and race and ethnicity can be shown. However, a much higher level of correlation is found between low achievement levels and poverty. The United States has an incriminating 22 percent of our children living in poverty. The schools that are in the most trouble are those located in neighborhoods with high levels of poverty. The correlation of poverty and low education achievement is higher than any other identifiable factor.

Housing in America has long been segregated by income level. The suburbanization of America in the last half of the 20th century was about social and economic segregation. People who live in middle and upper income neighborhoods can afford to pay for quality schools. The poor who have been left behind cannot pay the cost of quality schools. In 1975, 15 percent of American people lived in poverty neighborhoods. Today, 31 percent of the American population lives in poverty neighborhoods. American trends of living in economically segregated neighborhoods have accelerated since 2000. Low achievement levels for children from poverty neighborhoods defy higher standards, better teachers and imaginative curriculum.

U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy, the Senate sponsor of No Child Left Behind, withdrew his support of the program for one reason. The program was not sufficiently funded.

The news about our public schools is not all bad. Many American schools are doing very well. The children and grandchildren of my wife and me are products of public schools. They attended safe schools, almost without exception had excellent teachers, and were well prepared for college educations. However, we have never lived in a neighborhood identified with poverty.

It is standard political rhetoric that our American schools are failing. This is simply not so. We have many excellent public schools that turn out outstanding graduates. We have others that could improve, but hardly qualify for the designation of “failing.” We do have too many failing schools, and their failures are accurately identified with poverty.

Of course, addressing poverty is not the only challenge in improving the performance of our public schools. There are at least four urgent needs in all our schools. The first is high expectations. One benefit of NCLB is that it carried expectations. It is a factor in education that has been neglected. Kids thrive on challenge. As in other areas of life, in education we will not get any more than we expect. Those expectations need to be stated clearly for schools, teachers and students.

The second is shared accountability. Education needs to be removed from the blame game. There has been too much finger pointing. Administrators, public officials, students and their families are in the education challenge together. “How can we help?” should be the attitude of all. “You should,” with a pointed finger at someone else, does not get us where we need to be.

The third is highly effective teachers. We cannot have quality schools without well-trained, well-paid, highly motivated teachers.

The fourth is often overlooked. We must have visionary school leaders. We need one in every school building. In my limited experience, I have seen creative principals transform schools. They love kids; they understand education; they value achievement. They work effectively with parents, teachers and community. They are the school’s face in the community and the heart of everything that takes place in the school building. A school will never be any better than its principal.

I have mentioned these four essentials as a reminder that improving our neediest schools is more that addressing the poverty issue. However, nail it down in your mind that 50 percent of kids growing up in poverty drop out of high school.

In America, we have 90,000 schools and 50 million students attend those schools. Every one of those schools and every one of those students are the business of churches and religious institutions of every kind.

Public education is not a project of rugged individualism. Public education is a communal exercise in which every student is a neighbor to be loved. We dare not leave the poor behind.

The Rev. Howard Bess is a retired American Baptist minister, who lives in Palmer. His email address is hdbss@mtaonline.net.

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