At the behest of Governor Scott Walker, the Wisconsin legislature expanded the voucher program statewide, even though it did not raise test scores in Milwaukee over the past 22 years.
As critics of the program feared, 75% of those who applied for vouchers are are not currently enrolled in public schools. Two-thirds are enrolled in private schools now.
Instead of helping needy students “escape from failing schools,” the usual claim of voucher proponents, the program transfers funds to private institutions, religious and secular.
Governor Walker is doing as he planned: strangling public education.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Another real non-shocker, but important to get out there for people to see.
No doubt to get the fact that charter/voucher programs are just “gubmint” welfare for the hedgucrats and edupreneurs.
But as long as criticism’s are based on falsehoods like Diane’s statement “even though it did not raise test scores”, then we really have no solid foundation upon which to build resistance. If “raising test scores” is not a sound, logical pedagogical teaching and learning practice then using test scores for critiques of the edudeformers agenda/practices is not valid, just like using educational standards and standardized testing, and the grading of students, teachers and schools are invalid and educational malpractices. Noel Wilson explains why in “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” found at: http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/577/700
May the spirit of Don Quixote surge forth from all who oppose the edudeformer’s malpractices and rise up and slay the purveyors of injustices and insanities!!!
Brief outline of Wilson’s “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” and some comments of mine. (updated 6/24/13 per Wilson email)
1. A quality cannot be quantified. Quantity is a sub-category of quality. It is illogical to judge/assess a whole category by only a part (sub-category) of the whole. The assessment is, by definition, lacking in the sense that “assessments are always of multidimensional qualities. To quantify them as one dimensional quantities (numbers or grades) is to perpetuate a fundamental logical error” (per Wilson). The teaching and learning process falls in the logical realm of aesthetics/qualities of human interactions. In attempting to quantify educational standards and standardized testing we are lacking much information about said interactions.
2. A major epistemological mistake is that we attach, with great importance, the “score” of the student, not only onto the student but also, by extension, the teacher, school and district. Any description of a testing event is only a description of an interaction, that of the student and the testing device at a given time and place. The only correct logical thing that we can attempt to do is to describe that interaction (how accurately or not is a whole other story). That description cannot, by logical thought, be “assigned/attached” to the student as it cannot be a description of the student but the interaction. And this error is probably one of the most egregious “errors” that occur with standardized testing (and even the “grading” of students by a teacher).
3. Wilson identifies four “frames of reference” each with distinct assumptions (epistemological basis) about the assessment process from which the “assessor” views the interactions of the teaching and learning process: the Judge (think college professor who “knows” the students capabilities and grades them accordingly), the General Frame-think standardized testing that claims to have a “scientific” basis, the Specific Frame-think of learning by objective like computer based learning, getting a correct answer before moving on to the next screen, and the Responsive Frame-think of an apprenticeship in a trade or a medical residency program where the learner interacts with the “teacher” with constant feedback. Each category has its own sources of error and more error in the process is caused when the assessor confuses and conflates the categories.
4. Wilson elucidates the notion of “error”: “Error is predicated on a notion of perfection; to allocate error is to imply what is without error; to know error it is necessary to determine what is true. And what is true is determined by what we define as true, theoretically by the assumptions of our epistemology, practically by the events and non-events, the discourses and silences, the world of surfaces and their interactions and interpretations; in short, the practices that permeate the field. . . Error is the uncertainty dimension of the statement; error is the band within which chaos reigns, in which anything can happen. Error comprises all of those eventful circumstances which make the assessment statement less than perfectly precise, the measure less than perfectly accurate, the rank order less than perfectly stable, the standard and its measurement less than absolute, and the communication of its truth less than impeccable.”
In other word all the errors involved in the process render any conclusions invalid.
5. The test makers/psychometricians, through all sorts of mathematical machinations attempt to “prove” that these tests (based on standards) are valid-errorless or supposedly at least with minimal error [they aren’t]. Wilson turns the concept of validity on its head and focuses on just how invalid the machinations and the test and results are. He is an advocate for the test taker not the test maker. In doing so he identifies thirteen sources of “error”, any one of which renders the test making/giving/disseminating of results invalid. As a basic logical premise is that once something is shown to be invalid it is just that, invalid, and no amount of “fudging” by the psychometricians/test makers can alleviate that invalidity.
6. Having shown the invalidity, and therefore the unreliability, of the whole process Wilson concludes, rightly so, that any result/information gleaned from the process is “vain and illusory”. In other words start with an invalidity, end with an invalidity (except by sheer chance every once in a while, like a blind and anosmic squirrel who finds the occasional acorn, a result may be “true”) or to put in more mundane terms crap in-crap out.
7. And so what does this all mean? I’ll let Wilson have the second to last word: “So what does a test measure in our world? It measures what the person with the power to pay for the test says it measures. And the person who sets the test will name the test what the person who pays for the test wants the test to be named.”
In other words it measures “’something’ and we can specify some of the ‘errors’ in that ‘something’ but still don’t know [precisely] what the ‘something’ is.” The whole process harms many students as the social rewards for some are not available to others who “don’t make the grade (sic)” Should American public education have the function of sorting and separating students so that some may receive greater benefits than others, especially considering that the sorting and separating devices, educational standards and standardized testing, are so flawed not only in concept but in execution?
My answer is NO!!!!!
One final note with Wilson channeling Foucault and his concept of subjectivization:
“So the mark [grade/test score] becomes part of the story about yourself and with sufficient repetitions becomes true: true because those who know, those in authority, say it is true; true because the society in which you live legitimates this authority; true because your cultural habitus makes it difficult for you to perceive, conceive and integrate those aspects of your experience that contradict the story; true because in acting out your story, which now includes the mark and its meaning, the social truth that created it is confirmed; true because if your mark is high you are consistently rewarded, so that your voice becomes a voice of authority in the power-knowledge discourses that reproduce the structure that helped to produce you; true because if your mark is low your voice becomes muted and confirms your lower position in the social hierarchy; true finally because that success or failure confirms that mark that implicitly predicted the now self evident consequences. And so the circle is complete.”
In other words students “internalize” what those “marks” (grades/test scores) mean, and since the vast majority of the students have not developed the mental skills to counteract what the “authorities” say, they accept as “natural and normal” that “story/description” of them. Although paradoxical in a sense, the “I’m an “A” student” is almost as harmful as “I’m an ‘F’ student” in hindering students becoming independent, critical and free thinkers. And having independent, critical and free thinkers is a threat to the current socio-economic structure of society.
You can be 185% of the poverty level to receive a voucher in Wisconsin. That means that a family of four making $72,000 a year can qualify for vouchers. (Those stats are from my memory and I might be slightly off) Giving vouchers to students who were never enrolled in public schools saves the taxpayers no money. They never attended a tax supported public schools. All this does is provide a free private education to people at tax payer expense, which means less money for public schools. It also gives a nice boost to private/parochial schools, mostly catholic, some Lutheran and a few non-denominational Christian schools, according to the available list. This makes no sense, but doesn’t surprise me. The goal is vouchers for all.
We were devout Catholics who enrolled our kid in parochial school. The kindergarten teacher called the kids by number rather than names and our kid, who has ADHD and ASD, was LOCKED IN THE CLOSET! We met with the principal who eventually told us they could not “handle” our kid and we were not welcome.
We transferred to a public school and he graduated and now attending college.
Not only do voucher school students never attend public schools, the schools receiving the vouchers do not accept all public school students.
Segregation academies revisited. Been there done that!
Diane:
I think that you are exaggerating the impact of this event.
As I mentioned on a post yesterday when this issue came up the reality is a little more nuanced :
There were 2,069 applicants for the 25 schools that will be admitted into the program. Each school will be guaranteed 10 vouchers each.
The remaining 250 students will be picked at random by DPI next week. Because of the random lottery, schools with more applicants have better odds of getting more vouchers assigned to them.
St. Francis Xavier Catholic School System in Appleton had the most students apply with 193. The Green Bay and De Pere area had four schools or school systems admitted to the program. Kenosha, Manitowoc, Oshkosh, Sheboygan and Wisconsin Rapids all had two each. There were 11 other communities with one school or system each.
Only 503 of the applicants attended a public school, while 1,393 went to private school last year. The rest were either not in school (101), home schooled (69) or coming from out of state (three).
The law as written does not give public school students priority in the lottery over those who are already in private school. Walker and Republican leaders in the Legislature said their intent was to give public school students priority, and said they’ll look at changing the law this fall. But that will be too late for the coming school year. My bold
…
All applicants, regardless of attending public or private schools, must meet income requirements. Those are $43,752 for a family of four, which is 185 percent of the federal poverty level. Married couples with two or more children can earn up to $50,752 and still qualify.
http://www.wiscnews.com/portagedailyregister/news/article_52ec97cc-c072-5d8b-9197-74dc7214d0a9.html
Wisconsin vouchers are about $6500 per student (2013?). Per pupil expenditures in Wisconsin are $11,774 (2011) There are 500 vouchers so their total cost is roughly $3.2 million. Since roughly 125 students will come from Public Schools the net effect on PS budgets will be about $1.77 million out of a total budget that is above $10,286 million!!
How is losing 125 students and 0.017% of the PS education budget strangling public education?
The question is why should public money be used to fund private and religious enterprises.
This is the nub of the question. Let me reverse it. Why shouldn’t every kid get a voucher and the parents can spend it to buy a year’s worth of education at any school they want?
For that matter, why shouldn’t people like me who have no children get a voucher to spend on whatever we want?
Because public education is a public good that is necessary for a democracy to thrive, and cash strapped school districts cannot afford to pay to support other school systems. Look at Chile. They give vouchers to anyone and the remaining public schools are of the lowest quality, starved of qualified teachers and resources.
What is “public money”? It is taxpayer money: yours and mine. The majority of Wisconsin voters and taxpayers elected Walker. You may not like it, but as someone famous said, “Elections have consequences.” As a taxpayer, if it currently costs me $11,700 to educate a child and that child’s parent is willing to sign the child up to be educated for $6,500 why shouldn’t I do it and save me the taxpayer $5000?
You’ll have to let us know when you receive that $5000K rebate for saving tax payer dollars and subsidizing religious education. It might be a first.
Oh and BTW, the way vouchers have played out in Chile is that tuition for private education has increased substantially, while monies for vouchers have not, so parents are responsible for paying the difference, which is very high.
Taxpayer money is money that is allocated to goods and services by agreement of the populace through a representative democracy for the public good. We all have a vote.
Vouchers aren’t the reverse of this idea, they are a different way of distributing this public money. The question is why first collect the public money then funnel it to private interests? Wouldn’t it be better yo just get rid of all public schools and let everyone keep their money in the first place? But this idea is generally rejected as well because MOST Americans see a shared value in educating as many as possible rather than a few.
So the issue remains, why redirect money to private and religious schools when the money was originally and democratically determined to be for the public good?
Walker’s experiment (or should I say ALEC’s) to give vouchers to a select few is like Walmart dumping responsibility for healthcare on Medicaid. Private schools cherry pick and leave the more difficult kids (more expensive) to the public schools. Parochial schools get financial support from the churches and endless parent fund raisers so the APPEAR much less costly. Plus they just kick out anybody they don’t want to teach.
Case in point, one of my friends recieved a letter from his daughter’s parochial high school that those earning below a “C” would be expelled. Try that in a public school.
At that school the “C” will likely become the new “F” and all students will have a higher GPA.
Why should the taxpayers of Wisconsin pay for private and religious school tuition?
You know this program is the camel’s nose under the tent.
“You know this program is the camel’s nose under the tent.”
Thank you. When all the signs are there that politicians, corporations and policy wonks from both parties aim to privatize public education across America, and our federal DoE has aligned the perfect storm for privatizers to unleash that tumult upon states, you don’t just ignore the camel’s nose.
It’s been over 20 years since Pinochet, who privatized education in Chile, stepped aside and democracy was restored, and despite protests from the masses, privatized education remains. If we learn anything from Chile, it should be that, once public education is gone, it’s virtually impossible to retrieve.
I am not sure “strangling” is purely financial. First, where I live, the voucher scheme is set to increase for the next two years. And the scheme will probably receive even more funding after the next two years, slowly increasing while the public unknowingly or unwillingly is putting their tax money where it doesn’t belong – in institutions with no responsibilities to the taxpayers.
Second, its about the message. Vouchers slap us upside the head and tell us that we are not doing a good job – its the inherent message they send. It is just the opposite. When controlling for poverty, the U.S. has the greatest public school system in the world. We graduate top academic scholars that go on to accomplish feats that makes the world jealous. So its not just about the money, its about the message that serves as a stranglehold.
Shouldn’t schools that receive taxpayer money have taxpayer oversight? In other words, shouldn’t the governing boards of these private schools have a publically elected representative? Seems like taxation without representation.
Accountability? What a quaint concept. We reserve that for public schools. Private schools are far too precious to require oversight. Free enterprise and all that.
You can incorporate accountability into a voucher program very easily. That is why some private schools decline to accept them.
Private schools are accountable to their parent customers. Withdrawing from a private school is the ultimate “democratic” decision. Parents “vote” with their feet. Isn’t that enough oversight? That and from the accrediting agency?
Government schools, by contrast, are expending public money, and the public expects responsible spending of tax money. Charters are in between, but there too the “supervision” and accountability is by parents voting with their feet.
Harlan, there’s something called a “public good.” The current attempts to destroy all within that category through corporate and political treachery does not make the concept a bad thing.
Furthermore, your use of the word “customer” speaks volumes. Neither students nor their children should be considered “customers,” because 1) schools should never be for-profit institutions; and 2) schools are institutions of learning that should transcend the vicissitudes of self-centeredness and politics.
Your private schools understand this; isn’t the whole concept of a cloistered “walled space” (or “academic haven,” as Sara Mosle recently called it, in her weird article about Diane in new issue of The Atlantic)– where you can select your own students and do your own thing–isn’t that what you guys are all about? That’s certainly where you get your academic advantage from. We in the public sphere are supposed to lie back and suffer irrationality from every direction despite our much higher calling to serve EVERY student, while you are insulated from everything.
And you know very well that this absurd “accountability” movement makes absolutely no sense, that they’re merely tools for the destruction of public schools as we know it. Imagine what these standardized tests would do to your private schools, were they to be subjected to such nonsense.
Could schools be private non-profit organizations like many charter schools?
Accreditation is optional for private 0-5 and K12 schools in most states, not a requirement.
In virtually all states, vouchers are available for eligible low income families with children ages birth – 5 who are in child care centers. The private programs that I’ve worked at which won’t accept vouchers are accountable to the state anyways, because such programs are required to be state licensed. They decided not to take vouchers primarily because they don’t cover the full cost of tuition and/or because they are just a temporary assistance program.
In my experience, it’s the meal program that private schools are most likely to not accept due to not wanting to be accountable to the federal government.
Jim M,
“1) schools should never be for-profit institutions;”
No, there is no problem with for profit schools as long as they don’t receive any “gubmint” monies whatsoever. Let them rise and fall as they will with the parents as “customers” being suckered into whatever scheme the privateers might concoct. And then let the lawsuits begin!!
duckmonkeyman:
That makes no sense. There are a huge number of programs that involve transfer payments at the State or Federal level that do not involve taxpayer representation beyond that which is incorporated in the original licensing or contract.
Actually, contracts are usually subject to oversight by elected officials. Even local school purchases have a chain of responsibility leading to someone that was elected and appointed people into positions of power (because we can’t vote on every principal and the purchases they make).
M:
Any expenditure of public funds can have auditable standards and requirements attached. This is a non-issue.
What bernie1815 might have in mind are programs like Head Start. There are a number of programs where the government purchases services from private entities rather than employing people to produce those services directly.
teachingeconomist:
I have bid on and won multiple ongoing service delivery contracts with Federal Agencies – US Navy, FDIC, NASA, NIH, DHS, etc.
Contracts are always subject to audits and renewals. Even ostensible multi-year contracts can be pulled for non-performance. I know because we have picked up the pieces when others have dropped the ball as occurred with one of our FDIC contracts. In most regards the Feds operate just the same as a private company on the back-end of a competitively bid contract.
I do not know the terms of the vouchers. Because they are need based, I suspect that they are one year renewables. Perhaps somebody who has actually received or managed education vouchers can provide the details.
Are you familiar with the changes in Head Start since Duncan collaborated with Sebelius, TE? There was always accountability in Head Start, but even more layers of accountability have been added recently.
Since the beginning Head Start has been funded by giving federal grants to private organizations. Perhaps Joe Nathan could talk a bit about this as I believe his mother began the Head Start program in the state of Kansas.
I am an Early Childhood Specialist and have worked in the field for 45 years, including in Head Start when it first started and within the past five years. I really don’t need to talk to someone about his mother’s experiences.
Head Start programs are accountable to the federal government, in addition to the public school districts or child care centers and regulatory agencies for the city and state in which they are situated.
And BTW, Head Start has been contracted to the public schools in my district ever since the mid 60s, so it’s never just been private contractors. We have both public and private contractors here.
If you agree with the original poster, those private providers should be cut off unless they have publicly elected members of their board. Do you believe that is good policy or is there some other oversight that might be sufficient?
TE:
I am not sure your comment was directed at me. If it was, I have lost the plot. My apologies.
As I said, there is a lot of regulatory oversight in Head Start, and this is true for state universal preschool programs, too, which also contract out to both public and private programs. This is common in many states because 0-5 education is not compulsory, so most programs for those ages are run privately.
Non-profits have “Boards”, as do large for-profit chains, but many centers are mom and pop programs that don’t typically have a “Board.” Federal, state and city government agencies awarding contracts and issuing licenses typically monitor all such programs, but their top positions are usually filled by appointed not elected officials.
Why not? Taxpayer money is directed to probate enterprises and subject to audits, ethics laws, and oversight. Why do the private schools want the money but deny taxpayers a right to voice how their money is spent? Isn’t that taxation without representation- i.e. taxing me for vouchers but deny me representation on what are now private-public schools?
Any thoughts on which schools a student should attend using Pell grants or how those schools use the tuition revenue?
probate => private
You know what I meant! Try typing on a Kindle. 🙂
bernie1815
All our government contracts had auditors, procedures, standards, and oversight. Maybe a contract with enforcement is reasonable, but it is back to the taxpayer representation in the terms of the contract. Can I as Tim Taxpayer now put in the contract what must be taught and what cannot be taught? Can I have trigger clauses where the private school is taken over by taxpayers if certain conditions are not met? Can I now audit the books of the private schools?
With voucher programs the accountability shoe is on the other private foot.
duckmonkeyman:
In principle, I do not see why not.
duckmonkeyman
I agree that, if private schools accept public money, they should be held accountable to the government. Most times, they are, but some schools are less accountable than others, such as charters and voucher schools, and I think this is the problem.
For example, when the UNO charter management organization in Chicago was awarded a $98M state grant to build two new schools and then UNO awarded no-bid contracts and jobs to relatives of their executives, they were called on it. However, eventually they and their CEO got a pass on this because it had not been written into the rules that charters must engage in competitive bidding. That stipulation has since been added, but it should have been built into regulations to begin with –especially when the state is giving away so much free tax payer money to private management organizations. For years, charters got a pass on standardized testing here, too.
I think today’s neo-liberal “reformers” are so enamored by the notion of hands-off on private enterprises that they have failed to specify even the most minimal regulatory requirements –and that needs to change.
A little publicized catch to states awarded the Race to the Top – Early Learning Challenge grant, which applies to preschools/child care centers, is the expanded accountability of private programs to the state, including family child care (day care programs that are in homes), which includes a newly required quality rating system for programs. It’s all very new, so we will have to wait and see if there is any backlash by private providers.
As long as private schools can opt to not accept students based on special education needs, behavior, or any other criteria, they should NOT be receiving public money. Period.
I don’t think you want to include “any other criteria” as public schools do not accept students who live outside their catchment area.
Sorry, I wasn’t clear. The Quality Rating System requirement of RttT-ELC applies to private preschools even if they don’t accept any public funding. That’s the rub.
The American with Disabilities Act (ADA) applies to all child care centers, too, as does Section 504, so private programs are required to make “reasonable accommodations” and not discriminate. Many don’t discriminate, some do so illegally. A well known case was filed against KinderCare, which entered into a settlement agreement.
“A little publicized catch to states awarded the Race to the Top – Early Learning Challenge grant, which applies to preschools/child care centers, is the expanded accountability of private programs to the state, including family child care (day care programs that are in homes), which includes a newly required quality rating system for programs. It’s all very new, so we will have to wait and see if there is any backlash by private providers.”
They won’t be able to enforce that, and they must know it. For goodness sakes. They can’t even regulate K-12 charters properly in Ohio. How many regulators are they going to hire? They’ll be lucky if they get self-reported information, and even that will require lots of contacts.
Duncan’s got that figured out, so I’m guessing he worked with Sebelius on this one, too, as he did regarding Head Start.
Since 0-5 education is not compulsory and there are a wide variety of programs and funding streams serving those ages, typically, they are all operating out of different government agencies in states. Therefore, a main focus of RttT-ELA is establishing coordination amongst the agencies. All states require that child care programs serving 0-5 populations be licensed –in my state, licensing is required whenever three or more unrelated children are served, regardless of setting, unless parents are onsite. So, this is being tied to state licensing –and that’s a huge chunk of the programs serving 0-5 year olds. (In many states, those child care programs may also be licensed to provide before and after school programs for school-age kids.)
The Quality Rating and Improvement System (QRIS) in most states is relatively new and, in my state, participation in it had been optional. Now, due to RttT-ELC, it’s mandatory. For example, state licensing requires a certain number of professional development hours for teachers each year and teachers now have to file self-reports of that online with the organization that was selected to be the coordinating agency in my state. Since it is a coordinating agency, that means state licensing officials have access to that data. Government officials can use the same state licensing representatives to monitor teachers and programs, so there’s no redundancy.
Of course, this is something Duncan promotes as a perk. Personally, I think that, once again, the Duncan reach and manipulation of states is just uncanny.
“They can’t even regulate K-12 charters properly”
“Reformers” are clever and very manipulative. They could regulate charters properly, but I think they just don’t want to and prefer to provide very minimal oversight.
Cosmic Tinker @ 7:21,
“Since 0-5 education is not compulsory ” It may not be compulsory but the government has to “supply” a “free and appropriate” education to all up to the age of 21 (at least here in the Show Me State). So one might make the case that any services that can shown to be appropriate and educational should have to be properly funded by the state.
Duane, That just applies to Special Ed in most locations. Also, states have their own laws regulating compulsory attendance, so it does vary, but, typically, while states must supply special ed programs for children ages 3-21 with disabilities, according to federal law, attendance for 3-5 year olds is usually not mandatory. Similarly, 0-3 programs are permissive, not compulsory.
It’s political patronage to religious schools. Charters are cutting into their market share. We saw the same thing in Indiana and now in Ohio. One can pretty much track “school reform” in midwestern states by looking at what Mitch Daniels did. Vouchers were inevitable.
I think it’s interesting politically because it’s tough for “liberal” reformers, or will be when vouchers become universally adopted in reform circles. They (supposedly) “drew the line” at straight payments to private schools but that’s a silly distinction. It’s meaningless. Once you buy the reform line and make no distinction between public and private schools (really, public and private funding, more importantly) the obvious next step is public funding for private schools. That’s what “agnostic” means.
Indiana then Ohio then Wisconsin.
I saw Cuccinelli in Virginia is proposing amending the state constitution there to allow public funding of religious schools. It’s part of the same “reform package” we’ve seen in state after state: vouchers, cybercharters, deregulate charter authorization, parent trigger, the whole works. All of these schools are going to end up looking like “no excuses” charters. My own local public school looks more and more like a “no excuses” charter under a decade of “reform.” It’s a shame, for those of us who didn’t buy into it.
For years now, america’s (intended) public schools have not been doing as well as other country schools throughout the world. america (intended) students are ranked 25th in the world in Math, 17th in science and 14th in reading.
Other countries students are advancing at the rate two to three times quicker than america’s (intended) schools.
So, world, what do these rankings tell you about the public schools and shall we say the lack of producing the finer students within the world. Finland schools ranked in the top 5% of the best of schools within the world.
The US has the highest rate of poverty amongst developed nations and the rankings are very different when controlled for poverty.
Please see, “It’s Poverty, Not Stupid”
http://nasspblogs.org/principaldifference/2010/12/pisa_its_poverty_not_stupid_1.html
Differences in the way countries calculate poverty rates make international comparisons difficult. Better to use other indicators of social class like self reported books in the home as this study did:http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/
I prefer telling the reformers, “It’s poverty, stupid!”
Since at the end of the Carnoy & Rothstein article provided by TE, the authors referred to the coming release of international test scores, please see their post regarding this after the release:
“International tests show achievement gaps in all countries, with big gains for U.S. disadvantaged students”
http://www.epi.org/blog/international-tests-achievement-gaps-gains-american-students/
This is a very complicated issue because of differences in the definition of poverty in different countries. The OECD, sponsor of the OISA tests, has looked at the issue and basically says it makes a difference but not much and not consistently across countries. If you look for example at the PISA reading scores of students with at least one college educated parent there is little to any difference in the rankings of countries – though the scores of students do go up a bit.
See http://www.oecd.org/pisa/pisaproducts/48852584.pdf and
Click to access PEPG11-03_GloballyChallenged.pdf
My preference is to look at Math scores rather than Reading scores since I believe that in general Math scores are a better indicator of schools as opposed to family and cultural norms.
For thirty years. Since “A Nation at Risk” report, Republicans and elite Democrats have been undermining teachers and public schools with well-coordinated efforts redirecting money away, endless unproven reforms, and limiting the voice of the teacher from the classroom. The effort has reached a fever pitch brought on by the great recession.
But remember, behind every statistic there is a real story. The rankings you mention have a strong poverty component. Plus in America we educate everyone.
“Plus in America we educate everyone.”
Yes, a very important distinction!
Also, as indicated in the article by Carnoy & Rothsein that I posted a link to above:
THE ACHIEVEMENT GAP BETWEEN LOWER INCOME AND HIGHER INCOME STUDENTS EXISTS IN ALL COUNTRIES.
So this is not an issue that is specific to America, contrary to what politicians and corporate “reformers” would like everyone to believe.
The problem is poverty and it exists in every nation. Governments like ours that do nothing to ameliorate poverty are culpable, not the teachers who are expected to fix poverty all by themselves, when educators have no control over the out-of-school factors involved in poverty. Politicians scapegoat educators to divert attention away from their own failures.
Cosmic Tinker:
That is a very peculiar reading of that finding. The simple fact is that there is a huge variance in performance across school districts after you control for all kinds of socioeconomic factors – see the OECD report I cited earlier. Either teachers and classroom practices make a difference or they do not.
I don’t care for vouchers but isn’t it foolish to complain when people who are paying for private school decide to take the cheaper voucher option. What would anyone expect?
Gannet publications owns most of the media. then Madison and the Milwaukee papers are John birtcher society members. This made the only news besides fox is in 80% of Wisconsin. this makes 80% of the voters uninformed because of corporate controlled media. This year alone Walker claims a 1/2 million dollar surplus. The budget watch group in Wisconsin show walkers truth in sentencing law cost Wisconsin 1.2 billion last year above the would have been cost. walker has caused all Wisconsin problems