A new report by UNICEF finds that the United States ranks second among the nation’s advanced nations in child poverty, with 23.1% of our children living in poverty. We are second to Romania, where the rate is 25.5%. Read the summary here.
Forgive me, but I think we are really number one. Romania is a very poor country that was subject to decades of misrule by Communist dictators. I visited Romania in 1990, soon after the execution of the dictator Ceauşescu and his wife. I saw desperate poverty and a collapsed economy that was not that of a developed nation. It was what we then called Third World. The nation has great potential, but it is certainly not in the same economic category as the highly developed United States, other than on a measure of child poverty.
So forget Romania. We lead the world’s advanced nations in Europe and Asia. We are number one in child poverty.
Since child poverty is the single most reliable indicator of low academic achievement, it stands to reason that anything our government and our nation can do to reduce child poverty will improve academic performance. Children are more likely to learn if they are healthy, well-nourished, and able to focus on their learning. Children who have a toothache or can’t see or hear well can’t focus. Children who are hungry can’t focus. Children who are not sure where they will sleep tonight can’t focus. Children who are worried whether their mother or father is safe can’t focus.
Why is it so hard to get the attention of our leaders tuned to what matters most? Why the pretense of a program like Race to the Top that the best way to meet the needs of poor children is to fire their teachers?
Diane
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Why do you say that low academic achievement is an indicator of child poverty?
Maybe this depends on how you define ‘academic achievement’. To me, academic achievement bares no relation to one getting ‘high’ grades, for that is not a measure of thinking, but rather a measure of how well can remember that what was drilled into one.
Child poverty is a reliable predictor of low test scores. Better? It shows up in every testing program, from the SAT to the ACT to the NAEP to state tests and internatioanl assessments.
A timely reminder of why ed reform is just often an excuse for not tackling poverty. You are more charitable than I am, though. Race To The Top and NCLB are just excuses for not addressing poverty. As long as we’re focussed on raising test scores, and blaming teachers for low performance, we’re not dealing with the primary reason poor, hungry, and neglected kids don’t perform well. And politicians and policy makers who don’t tackle poverty are guilty of, at best, child neglect.
And as states let ALEC write their NCLB waivers, they end up rewarding the schools serving the most affluent families. http://okeducationtruths.wordpress.com/2012/04/25/rewardschools/
Shhhhh….The American citizens are not suppose to be aware of this. When have you heard the media investigating this somber US ranking? Neither presidential candidates’ educational reform platform addresses this….even once. But you do hear of grand plans to cut Medicare, Medical Assistance, Social Security, Planned Parenthood, Welfare, and the solution to end all educational evils….’dismantle public schools because the bad teachers are to blame for low test scores!’ Not a word how, in order to do so, teachers would have to eliminate poverty. Instead of feeding fat cats, where are our presidential canditaes on these desparately important and health education and welfare issues???
Why haven’t teachers been able too solve all economic inequities within society; rebuild neighborhoods, create jobs, reverse malnutrition and end high crime “.
The fact is….The US is 2nd ONLY to Romania in poverty level.
We are #2 in Child poverty!
But that won’t discourage our leaders from pushing forward to out rank all others!
Yea (((confetti fills the air)))….
And, bye crackie, success will soon be ours!…
The ever competitive U.S.A. pumped-up government is hell bent and determined to
make us # 1 no matter what it takes!.
.Cheer along as they destroy public neighborhood schools …That, in itself, just might push us over the top!
For extra measure, bust up those school employee unions, fire teachers and get those unemployment lines long and hopeless..
We can do this people!
Take from the poor and engorge the rich…
“RACE TO THE TOP!”……ready? set? …..go!
(((release balloons..)))
end sarcasm mode
The US is a great country is many ways, but have we lost our way? The US has a dismal record/ranking in a many areas that impact educating children…which do not fall at the feet of teachers. In 2012, Teachers educating America’s future contributors have their backs against the proverbial wall. They are not only fighting misguided politicians and a misinformed public ignorant to real reform, but they are fighting the societal affects/effects of what we see below. These are some of the issues that contribute to educational inequities that we Americans sweep under the rug, while trashing teachers for test scores (which are an apples to oranges comparison anyway)
Infant Mortality (#41),
Heath Care System Performance (#37),
out of pocket health expenses (#2)
Obesity (#1), – affects mortality, cancer, SES, education rates , etc.. 20 years ago, not the case.
Laziness (#1), Eber. (2010) America wins Laziness Gold,
anxiety disorders (#1)
oil consumption (#1)
gasoline pump prices (#148)
Military Spending (#1),
The Government’s Commitment to education (#134),
And the World’s model for democracy:
Political Participation (#17)
The U.S. ranks 17th in democracy
Earlier this week, I spent two days along with 60 other school administrators (Superintendents and Principals) from the area districts to learn how to become a “Lead Evaluator” for the implementation of the new APPR (Annual Professional Performance Review).
This new law requires district administrators to conduct multiple evaluations on every teacher (60% of the score), then add the teachers’ students’ results (20%) on flawed state assessments (remember the Pineapple story?), and another 20% on the results from local assessments. This score will give each teacher a score based on a 100-point scale and determine whether or not they are “highly effective, effective, developing, or ineffective”. The state will be providing the scores to the districts because they are “secured tests”. Teachers will not be able to glean significant data from the tests to see how they can improve their instructional practice, because the state will not provide schools with the test questions to allow for detailed and accurate item analysis.
It is not difficult to see where this train is going. Teachers will be vying for students that would be considered to have a positive impact on their APPR score and praying that students deemed to have a negative impact will be placed in one of their colleague’s classes. When the scores of individual teachers are made public (parents will be allowed access to their child’s teacher’s score and will assuredly end up on Facebook before they hit the parking lot), they will be demanding that their child be placed with the teacher with the highest score. Teachers will be pitted against other teachers, students, and parents.
This system was put in place allegedly to make it easier to fire ineffective teachers. However, if one looks at the law, it is now much more onerous to terminate an ineffective teacher than it was previously. The law was also put in place in order to be a contender for the infamous Race To the Top (RTtT) money. NYSUT supported the initiative assuming it would infuse more money into a system that desperately needs it. However, the money did not go to school districts to offset the massive decreases in state aid, but rather to the BOCES across the state in order to implement the new APPR.
Mr. Cuomo and Dr. King have cited many “facts” leading up to these massive changes. One example they have used is: New York schools are “Number 1 in spending but 34 in terms of results”. However, this statistic has been discredited. Education Week, which publishes the annual “Quality Counts” guide, ranked New York State No. 2 in the nation in a comprehensive analysis of policy and performance. Other statistics used for US schools in comparison to other industrialized nations have us ranked quite low. For example, scores from the 2009 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) show that US students ranked 14th in reading, 17th in science and 25th in math out of 34 countries. However, when one digs deeper, the “facts” change. Dr. Gerald N. Tirozzi, Executive Director from the National Association of Secondary School Principals dug deeper and found that in order to get a more accurate assessment of the performance of U.S. students would be to compare the scores of American schools with comparable poverty rates to those of other countries. He found that Schools in the United States with less than a 10% poverty rate had a PISA score of 551. When compared to the ten countries with similar poverty numbers, that score ranked first. That’s right folks, the United States ranked FIRST! Finland was second. As Mark Twain once said, “There are three kinds of lies; lies, damn lies, and statistics.”
As an educator for 20 years, I am proud of our schools and our teachers. They work hard and deserve our respect. Teachers and students should never be reduced to a number. It is bad for education and it is bad for our nation. APPR as it now stands should be repealed. For the sake of our children, please contact your state Assemblyman or Assemblywoman to get rid of this law. Our children deserve better.
Sincerely,
Tim Farley