An economist recently predicted trillions of dollars of increased productivity if schools raised test scores and thus eliminated poverty.
This teacher has a different view, grounded in reality, not speculation.
“As a teacher in a high poverty urban school, I would like to weigh in here. My school is not set up to eliminate poverty. That argument is rubbish. Would any of these economists like to put a price on the psychological toll of poverty? My kids are worried about getting shot. It is a common occurrence in the neighborhood. They eat the school breakfast totally lacking in nutrition as if it were mana from heaven. Some wear the same clothes day after day. The vast majority are not focused on their studies due to shouldering the unrelenting burdens of poverty.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Texas Education.
It’s “magical thinking” to assume that raised test scores can have an impact on poverty. Post-secondary education (technical or academic) is required to have any hope of a decent paying job or career; the cost of which is making it more and more unaccessible to those already living in poverty. There must also be jobs available that pay wages/salaries that can raise one out of poverty or near-poverty. Somehow the economists never address those components.
Some economists, those not blinded by neoliberalism, austerity, and trickle-down and “the market solves all problems” mythology, such as Dean Baker, James K. Galbriath, Michael Hudson, Paul Krugman, Nomi Prins, Jack Rasmus, and Joseph Stiglitz, do address those components. Unfortunately, none of them has the ear of the President, Congress, or the Fed, all of whom are in the pockets of the “too big to jail” Wall Street banks.
As long as profits matter more than people’s lives, there will never be democracy in this nation.
what is it…..? something about being able to be uber-rich and “gain the whole world”, yet the value of one’s soul is infinitely greater than that. Yes life > profit…..ask “the rich man and Lazarus” which one is more important.
Number one way to eliminate poverty? Legislate that the rich must give more to the poor, because many times the poor are poor because of oppression by the rich. How can the poor get more, by increasing the minimum wage and decreasing (capping) executive salaries and stock-holder manipulations.
For example, to increase their P to E ratio and look good “on paper” Walmart recently bought back a large number of shares from their stockholders, which made the remaining shares have higher value (and shareholders cashed in big time). Yet, the same money Walmart used to by back shares (in order to make the “haves” richer), could have gone to the employees, and it is estimated each persons hourly wage would’ve gone up by $ 6/hr.
Those with money and power create and utilize unjust, unfair economic equations, in order to make “unjust, deceitful, fraudulent” wages; which is oppressing the poor and keeping money rightly earned by workers from them.
Yes, the status-quo hypocrites will argue that if you raise minimum wage, then the rich will just increase costs because the rich will always want to make the same profit margin.
James 5:1-10 has a lot to say about wealth-hoarding and fraudulent economics, as does all of Scripture.
We can, but won’t, look to Norway, Sweden, Denmark & Finland, where there is far less poverty, but higher levels of student achievement (not a coincidence, but a consequence). These nations also have a strong and widespread social safety net and most residents understand that their high taxes are in everyone’s best intersts because there ia a sense of the Common Good and a Social Contract there, unlike the extreme selfish individualism here.
Read The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger by Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson.
Excellent, yes I will read that. I debate with those “rugged individualists” who will claim that the purpose of work is to make money (what about before money existed?), and I respond that the real/fundamental purpose is to produce a good or service that others need and can use (and they are working to do the same for me). The “making money” part is secondary to creating and providing the good or service, but we are so twisted as to justify the salaries of pro-athletes (whose value of their supposed “good or service” is minimal, as compared to farmers, who make much less). So, one’s salary/wage has no relationship to the importance, vitality, necessity of the good or service they provide? For if it did, then farmers would be our millionaires and pro-athletes would be making minimum wage (which is the worth of their “service”). Our current scale of value of errant and unsustainable, and when our farmers don’t have the assets to grow the next crop (while our pro-athletes live in multiple mansions) our economy will implode (as do all nations who have false equations). Israel had the same problems before Babylon subjugated them….call it judgment/curse, call it karma….what a nation sows, that it will reap.
The Trans Pacific Trade Agreement will make matters worse for working class Americans by granting corporations power across borders and flooding the tech. jobs with foreign workers. This is NAFTA on steroids.
What did Cain say after he killed Abel, “am I my brother’s keeper?”
US corporations are practicing “ecainomics”, in that they don’t care about life-quality in the US; they only care about themselves. May the Lord of the Sabbath bring rest to the oppressed poor, by giving us a Congress with the guts enough to confront these injustices.
REDPILLED, THANK YOU. TRUE. Yes, we do have EXTREME SELFISH INDIVIDUALISM in U.S.A. This is why we are in deep trouble and our Constitution is not being held up by people who were sworn in office to uphold the Constitution, including the Bill of Rights.
Amen!
Not that the Overclass wants to eliminate poverty, since it profits off of it – think declining wages amid rising profits, increased sales taxes coupled with reduced capital gains taxes, foreclosed homes sold in bulk to private equity players, payday loans, privatized prisons, and on and on – but if it actually allowed people to join unions, which in the private sector is essentially impossible, poverty would be reduced, if not eliminated.
It’s no accident that the creation of the broad middle class that politicans fatuously and hypocritically laud, corresponded to the highest rates of unionization in US history.
Unions are the greatest means of redistributing wealth and the most effective anti-poverty program ever conceived. That’s precisely why the default policy of every Overclass, and the political brokers who represent it, is to undermine and attack Labor, whether organized or not.
Sixteen tons, and what do you get? —
One more economist shovelin’ — well, you know.
Perfect!
Diane: I am deeply troubled by your comment that the food provided by school breakfast is not nutritious . I have worked for Nutrician Services for 21 years and the schools in Seattle, WA. Are working very hard to send the message that breakfast is paramount to learning each day. We offer whole grain products such as oatmeal, toast, breakfast pizza and burritos. A choice of fresh fruit and juice as well as milk of course. So what do you say is not nutritious ? Watch who you insult on your way to making a point. Debra Denby a college educated lunch room manager at Garfield High.
Debra Denby, the comment about school lunches came from a teacher in an urban school, not from me. I have no knowledge of whether school lunches are nutritious.
The comment came from me. The first ingredient in the majority of breakfast items in my district is sugar. I have no idea what you are dishing up in Seattle. I am happy to hear that it is more nutritious.
Can you vouch that the same is true of all schools in the country? Just because that’s your experience doesn’t mean that the experience of the teacher who posted that comment is invalid.
Debra,
Please forgive your mistake in rush to complain without reading and checking properly the writer of a thread.
Could you imagine people without college graduation are being manipulated by threat and empty promises from the rich without conscience, but ONLY money minded style?
I hope that you will tell the writer the first ingredient in your offered breakfast menu, like in pizza, juice and burritos.It takes courage and honesty to complain or to apologize for what we or people commit mistakes.
Any rushed decision-making will yield unfavorable result. Back2basic
At my school, breakfast consists of white bread pastry with icing, chocolate milk, and these raisin things that are made out of watermelon, that are very sticky and coated in sugar.
The Democratic Party has dropped the ball on these critical issues. What does it say about the party when Andrew Cuomo wields significant power, and the front-runner for the 2016 presidential nomination is known for her connections to Wall Street (and foreign policy hawkishness)?
It’s tragic, but the federal government has neglected educational inequity. Our representatives thought it was wise to pour trillions into Iraq/Afghanistan despite the fact that the domestic economy was floundering. America’s union leadership should not be spared from criticism either. From what I can gather, they have failed to seriously challenge the Democratic Party’s complacency.
Furthermore, the prevailing educational model is broken. Politicians irresponsibly push college-for-all, and clearly ignore the economic pressures confronting young people. Tens of millions of lives are being detrimentally impacted by misguided macroeconomic policies, but you’re just as likely to hear a member of Congress complaining about a lack of global leadership. This is the real problem…
Well said!
“An economist recently predicted trillions of dollars of increased productivity if schools raised test scores and thus eliminated poverty.”
Why would you write that this study claims that raising test scores would eliminate poverty? It simply doesn’t say that.
Good question! You punched a huge hole. Good for you, FLERP.!
Also, regarding the following: “This teacher has a different view, grounded in reality, not speculation. . . .”
FYI, here’s a section of the report’s conclusion:
Yes!
I love it when the voice of the teacher appears here.
All of this was written about, discussed, etc at great length throughout the country in the 60’s, 70’s, 80’s. 90’s. Today it seems total amnesia has struck these “reformers.” What is totally pathetic is that there is a need for this teacher to write this. Didn’t everyone read those best sellers about the effects of poverty on city students? Is what is going on today another case of re-inventing the wheel, or worse, denying all the knowledge accumulated over the past fifty years? I feel that we can’t win this because we are dealing with deliberate, purposeful idiocy. Obama’s failing is that he never appreciated the value, or the necessity, of the Bully Pulpit.
To Nino deProphetis:
Thank you for your honesty with hope, as per your sentence: “I feel that we can’t win this because we are dealing with deliberate, purposeful idiocy.”
The word FEEL and the expression in “we are dealing with deliberate, purposeful idiocy” still give people some hope and some solution to win over any idiots
Once, people do not FEEL, but KNOW FOR SURE, it would be no solution and no hope.
Hopefully, some or all educational practitioners will come up with a practical solution to deal with “greedy” and “weasel” idiots.
God-given mission job for all educators is to cultivate and to transform learners from a state of being savage into civilized thoughts and acts through languages, literature, poems, musics and painting. Science and computer is the result from our imagination and creation which are nurtured from languages needed for communication to provide us with convenient lifestyle.
IMHO, for the past 5000 years plus, the real culprit that causes all problems in society is the BLIND FAITH, easy FORGIVENESS and GULLIBLE COMPASSION. Con artists and weasels always seize the opportunity to create chaos and division like class and race to become top ten movers and shaker.
If educational practitioners can influence learners the true meaning of humanity and civility, then we will have one less division in class without righteousness or rightfulness, only left with skin color to be dealt in the eyes of the beholders
People with righteousness please spare your thoughtful consideration that the unfortunate lacks everything from basic logical intelligence to the basic necessary for a survival from their birth.
People with rightfulness please remember that all necessary needs are required effort, responsibility, and hard work to have, NOT from DEMAND due to humanity reason.
In conclusion, if people try to cultivate an opened mind that any leader with lust for power, ego and greed will ALWAYS manipulate your WANT with all empty promises, then people will acknowledge that whoever can BUY you, they can also BURY you. In other word, they can make you or bring glory to you; they will also break you with ease. Therefore, people with righteousness and rightfulness need to make peace with each other, and EVILS or war will cease and peace will return.
Health is gold and is good for everyone, but stress is misery and is bad for health to anyone. Therefore, anyone and any policy that imposes stress on learners and educational practitioners, will be considered as CANCEROUS DISEASE in society that needs to be eliminated in election or any town hall meeting by votes. Back2basic
Weasel idiots! Hee, hee. I hear you, and I know, from our email conversations, that by ‘weasels’ you mean that evil, greedy people are small minded, like weasels.
There are so many people who offer empty promises, because good people are so trusting, and thus gullible. As you told me, we must be vigilant.
I love that you use the words “educational practitioners” instead of teachers.
I agree wholly, when you say: If educational practitioners can influence learners the true meaning of humanity and civility.”
In fact, that is what I felt was the social objective when I taught any grade. Through stories, like those once told to human children throughout all mankind’s history, the human stories unfold. In grade 7, my colleague used “The Crucible” while I used the YA Novel “The Witch of Blackbird Pond,” to open up the young minds to the lack of humanity and civility when superstition rules humans, and civility and empathy disappear because someone is perceived as ‘other.’
Nowadays, curricula is mandated, and the ‘objectives’ to memorize for a test becomes the main goal.
Your thinking is very deep, May, and I hear you… there is a cancerous disease affecting human civilization, and it can be seen in Nigeria, but in more insidious ways in what our media feeds our young minds on television…aggression & violence as way to accomplish goals and forget about collateral damage… American Sniper comes to mind.
Bye for now.
Dear Susan:
I am happy to acknowledge your giggles and agreement with my expression.
If you could attend the Chicago conference, I would guarantee that you will meet with many educational practitioners who will bring you a lots of laughter from their experiences and stories in the past 10 or 12 years where you were forced to retire. You must be glad to miss that frustrated period of chaos, and to easily afford the early retirement with health and joy.
There is still 11 more weeks for you to arrange. Your grandchild will have more showcases for you to enjoy in the future. You need to make sure that your husband and children do not misunderstand the purpose of your trip to Chicago. Please enjoy your free time to connect with many good educational practitioners.
Reading good books, watching documentaries, travelling will not be compatible to meeting and communicating with many conscientious educators in one place. Yes, my sister in spirit, your mantra of THINK, REFLECT , and consider before DO anything will help others to take BACK one step in order to spring ONE MILE FORWARD.
We cannot walk through mountain directly, but it takes many generations with creation to build a small and winding road to bring us from one side to the other side. Gradually, dynamites, airplanes, and jets have brought us not only over mountain and oceans, but also to other planets like moon.
Similarly, if mountain is the state of savage, walk is the old learning technique of memorize, then dynamites, airplanes, jets and spaceships will be all innovative techniques of teaching and learning
where ALL EDUCATIONAL PRACTITIONERS WILL WORK TOGETHER to finalize the best technique to be called National Standards Curriculum with foundation OR FRAME in humanity, civility, and freedom of expression, then teaching technique will cultivate or transform learners from savage to civilized and tranquil mind. From this guiding foundation/frame, each state will freely choose textbooks or authors from their local or international sources to cultivate their students. Peace on earth will not be in vain whenever all learners reach their civilized and tranquil mind.
If all PUBLIC educational practitioners TRUST their own PUBLIC sources where they graduated from, then any PRIVATE sources regardless of their reputation CANNOT influence or impose their power OVER PUBLIC sources. I must be a dreamer :))
Thank you sister for your support of my dream. May.
Dear May,
I was in the midst of writing to the publisher at Oped News, who wishes me do a narrative to accompany that wonderful video that Diane put up here recenlty, and which I linked at his new site. I took a break from thinking about what he had asked me, to read Diane’s blog, when I came upon your comment in my e-mail, where I get the feed from this blog.
I read it twice. Not because the English reflects a foreign speaker, but because the beauty of your language – It was hard to miss its lyrical quality as you explained the vision that you have for a curricula. You are not alone, my sister, in knowing what a real practitioner brings to the stories that we select, the curricula we write in order to meet the SOCIAL OBJECTIVES.
IF i had the time, I would link to other professionals who are talking about the socializing activities that center on discussions of the stories hat have informed mankind forever.
As a primary school teacher for the first part of my career, and seventh grade English and arts teacher for the last decade of my practice, and as a playwright, I know the power of stories.
The vision for the curricula that you described so lyrically, is exactly what is missing today in these test-oriented texts, where children read for information, but not to reflect and then, NEXT…after thoughtful discussion, extract the deeper meanings, that like a CODE are hidden in the words.(MIchelle Pfeifer comes to mind in that awful movie “Dangerous Minds” where –faced with ‘teaching’ poetry to hostile high school students, she challenged them ( a great motivation) to uncover the code in the poet’s words. They got it… the deeper meaning.
Motivation is the BIG problem underlying the failure of the CC crap.
The grunt on the line, we teachers facing those youngsters, have to convince them to learn… they are children! A test-score is not motivation. It is up to the education practitioner to know her students, and thus she needs the RIGHT to choose the materials that allow her to meet the objectives… (After all, she will be evaluated on how she met the age-apropriate objectives.
I hear the word CURRICULLA a lot, . I do not hear the words that were drummed into my head when I was a student teacher…. MOTIVATION & OBJECTIVES.
Just to clarify, NYS provided the objectives for each subject and grade, in all subject areas. I possesses, in a box in my back room, those very curricula GUIDES, for NYC in Science and spelling. I also have the NYS guide for Art. IN addition, I have the huge books that were the PERFORMANCE OBJECTIVES for English Language and MATH which were created when NYC was in the Pew Funded, genuine , real NATIONAL STANDARDS RESEARCH. (Hee, hee, If I didn’t have those tomes, then I would believe I imagined the HARVARD -BASED research on THE EIGHT PRINCIPLES OF LEARNING
for which I wash chosen as the NYC COHORT.
BUT I DIGRESS… lets get back to the materials that make a successful curricula in the humanities.
The meaning of stories is found in the behavior of the characters, either fictional or historical. Reading for information, what happened next, or what did the character do, is not the same as asking “Why did he say that?” or, what do you think might have happened if …” In fact, I clearly remember, the specific lesson that I did which were geared for discovering facts.. I remember because I and to state that as an OBJECTIVE
I know two things, May, that say it all. I know what I did for forty years. I know, also, what worked to produce children who could think, and thus, they could write. Listening, speaking reading and then writing… I didi not invent that process… it is what it is. Every literacy teacher knows this, and those who ensure the process of thinking takes place –through reading and discussion– facilitate the writing.
The trick is to motivate the kids, and that is easy if the ‘right stories’ ae chosen… those that have the classic themes which I studied when I took my Children’s Literature courses, all those decades ago. I still have the textbook, filled with stories an illustrations by the top children’s writers. I have shelves of the picture books I used, and the YA novels I purchased for my classroom, so I could initiate conversations about how people solved dilemmas, or what the role od children had been back when our country was new.