Emma Brown of the Washington Post reports a dramatic increase in student poverty rates and increased segregation of the poorest students since the “Great Recession” of 2008.
The data are supplied by a nonprofit called Edbuild.
It includes a stunning comparison between maps of the United States, showing student poverty, in 2006 and 2013.
Student poverty has increased most in the South and the MidWest.
New Mexico saw a huge increase in student poverty, from half its students to 87%.
The state that has seen the most growth in student poverty is Florida.
Schools and teachers, of course, will be blamed and expected to cure what is a structural economic problem.
The Common Core and rigorous tests will not fix poverty.
This is an appalling commentary on what matters most in the United States today.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
There just doesn’t seem to be a way to get any sense of urgency around wages from government. It seems like a profound disconnect to me- schools will just be treading water unless the situation gets better for families. “Treading water” is probably optimistic- they’ll be drowning because they’ll have more and more from lower income homes and less and less funding.
They’re STILL talking about the “skills gap” as if the problem is the quality of the workforce and that just isn’t true. If it WERE true wages would be rising because employers would be competing for skilled workers and raising wages. The only urgent or immediate response I’ve seen on wages didn’t come from government at all- it came from labor unions with Fight for Fifteen. I still don’t think we have any recognition of the “real” economy, and the finance industry crash was in 2009. If they haven’t got it yet with that kind of a profound implosion they’ll never get it.
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I think we have more of an income gap than the skills gap the politicians and media discuss. Globalization is one of the main causes, but privatization, not just in education in many other public services, enhances the income disparities. When they privatize, the private company substitutes low paying jobs for middle class ones, and we, the taxpayer wind up paying more so the executives can feather their nests. http://www.projectcensored.org/privatization-of-free-market-industry-costs-billions-more-than-public-services/
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New World Order … NAFTA and TPP. It’s all connected by $$$$$.
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They love the skills gap because the skills gap puts the onus on the labor force. They could all be working if they would just “up-skill”. The first person I heard promoting it was Scott Walker, which really tells you all you need to know.
They were at it again yesterday. They all quote Tom Friedman, who is apparently America’s expert what the lower classes need to do.
http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/thinktank/Philly-others-should-adopt-K-14-school-model.html
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I attended Philly schools as did my brother, and we both have done fine and weathered the ups and downs of our careers. I read the link. Without stating, they imply that there is a STEM shortage, and we know that’s a lot of hot air. As far as technical training goes, we should try to prepare students better for trades. We have a shortage of plumbers and electricians. I think Texas does a good job in their community college system preparing students for 21st century careers. At Texas Tech they offer a two year associates in wind turbines as well as other offerings for the oil and gas industry.
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Since the election of Reagan, everything I predicted has come to pass: low wages, increased poverty, decrease of a middle class, sending jobs to other countries, importing lower-wage skilled workers. The U. S. made no plan to increase skills in the public schools opting instead for test scores in math and reading. Teaching current skills would have taught the math, and reading was not a real issue. Kids could read well enough, and the needed reading skill was in the content area of those skills. Meanwhile, the print shop in our school harkened back to the 1940’s, the drafting class was from the 50’s, the computers were for computer training only rather than use for what students would really need in the future. Teachers for trades and math were impossible to find because they made more money elsewhere. But the country functioned like GM, and allowed South East Asia and Japan take it all.
I doubt the charters can help because not enough money is being spent to train kids and everyone is chasing test scores. And in addition we would need to forget TPP and place tariffs on foreign companies.
People like Gates and the Waltons are not Americans, but internationalists. That is their viewpoint. Even if all those scores come up, the labor situation remains as it is.
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retired teacher
I agree that we should do much more to prepare people for trades.
Many people turn up their noses at carpenters, electricians and plumbers, etc but the trades offer a lot — a well-paying job that can’t be outsourced, an opportunity to be your own boss and be creative, mental stimulation, pride in workmanship (to name just a few).
In fact, they offer things that lots of (if not most) office jobs don’t
Have you ever read “Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work”?
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Democrats and Republicans alike are fixated on indirect solutions, such as testing, merit pay, charter schools and vouchers– none of which has any evidence of systemic promise. They have abandoned any hope of systemic change. Here are some ideas that we need to demand they advocate for and act upon: http://huff.to/1ToD3kO
http://www.arthurcamins.com
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Increasing poverty; wider gaps; more segregation; growing governmental indifference to children wrapped in loftier-rising rhetoric. The “change we can believe in.”
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Well-stated.
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“Hope and Chains”
Regimes change
But core remains
To rearrange
The Hope and Chains
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Right on!
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Hmm, and SAT scores have been dropping since about the same time. Hmmm. Nah, couldn’t be. Has to be those awful teachers.
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I’m not worried about SAT scores because I think it’s probably due to more and more selling of the SAT and more students who are mandated to take it.
This is what worries me:
“Simply doing the same things we have been doing is not going to improve these numbers,” Schmeiser said in a statement. “This is a call to action to do something different to propel more students to readiness.”
The same crowd will use it as another “urgent call to action!” for the same ed reform template- after all- they “know what works” and it’s the ed reform policies they’re paid to promote. Duncan’s probably already got his “movement” campaign talking points for a post-Labor Day tour.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/sat-scores-at-lowest-level-in-10-years-fueling-worries-about-high-schools/2015/09/02/6b73ec66-5190-11e5-9812-92d5948a40f8_story.html
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It is an interesting and sobering bit of research, produced by an organization with definite “reform” roots and perspectives.
While everyone agrees that child poverty is tragic and needs to be addressed, I’m not sure that everyone will be on board with what Edbuild is proposing. They (very correctly) see local control and an overreliance on local property taxes as a primary driver not only of funding inequity, but also of hypersegregation. Changing funding sources and blurring or eliminating district and school zone borders is an excellent solution to the problem of concentrated poverty, but it will come as a shock and at a cost to the district system.
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More solutions- forced return of corporate offshore profits, financial transactions taxes, elimination of “carried interest, a more progressive income tax structure, a tax on companies that pay Boards and CEOs’ excessive remuneration and, tax credits for individuals joining unions, since unions are the best method to assure, productivity gains are returned to those who are responsible for the gains and the best protector of democracy, against oligarchs..
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Okay, but these are Federal-level solutions. How would any additional revenue filter down to schools controlled by states and local school districts?
I think the broader point they are making is that separate-but-equal doesn’t work (and is also illegal), but that the mere state of being separate is unequal. The dumping and concentrating of poor, mostly minority kids into certain districrs long predates NCLB or any other “reform”. It is a central feature of how we choose to organize and fund our public schools.
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Dr. Putnam (Our Kids) reports that many successful initiatives to address the income gap (even back in the 1920s when there was a similar income gap) began at the local level. The development of high schools in Iowa was one such local plan. Maybe we can learn from history.
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There are a lot of interesting points concerning international income mobility in this paper: http://qje.oxfordjournals.org/content/129/4/1553.full
A summary can be found here: http://www.voxeu.org/article/where-land-opportunity-intergenerational-mobility-us
along with a link to the NYT article with a great interactive graphic about intergenerational income mobility down to close to the county level.
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Re: te’s Oxford Journal research citation
3 references to Chetty, 1 – Hanushek and, 1 -Charles Murray.
The paper supports the Koch Prescription- “Turn the issue over to the locals”, (where it can.die quickly).
Better solution- Oligarchs return the federal government, to its intent, “of the people, by the people and, for the people”,
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Linda,
Did you read the paper?
The paper purely descriptive. It describes in more detail how a household’s zip code influences the future lives of the children in the family by looking at the experiences of 40 million people.
The study also find that segregation, degree of inequality, school quality (measured by test scores(controlled for income), drop out rates, higher funding levels, and class size), social capital indices, and family structure in the places where a family resides are correlated with intergenerational income mobility.
There are no policy recommendations in the paper.
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Publicly-paid researchers at the University of Wisconsin- Madison published a 6 year study in JAMA Pediatrics, reporting that children in poverty suffer from slowed development in parts of the brain, as a result of a deprived environment, including poor nutrition, instability, stressors like overcrowded housing and greater exposure to violence.
I applaud the willingness of the researchers to focus in this area.
Too many faculty and researchers, at publicly-supported universities, have either taken grants from plutocrats or, out of an ideology of superiority, published findings that served moneyed interests.
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We had a levy campaign where a local employer was able to make the case for the public schools that they are dealing with a larger group of low income and poor children and less funding, so treading water shouldn’t mean we all point fingers at them for not adding enough value or whatever. You really just need some credible advocates who are outside the school because the whole “self interested!” national campaign theme of ed reform has really taken hold. It’s a shame but that’s the reality. Find an outside advocate who can explain that a 50% low income and poverty school is a different school than a 30% low income and poverty school, although it looks the same 🙂
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Poor doesn’t equal dumb…it equals disadvantaged. Less at home help time, less food in the belly to concentrate with, less confidence, less ability to see a future in current work, less…less…LESS but not dumb.
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For a sobering look at child poverty, read Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis by Tobert Putnam. Shame on us for watching this happen!
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Correction: author is Robert Putnam.
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Child poverty is about low wages. This is clearly not a concern of those who believe in privatization as they want teacher wages to be lower. If teachers have children, the privatizers do not care if those children suffer economically. Broad came to the charter movement from the perspective that religious schools did a better job educating students at a cheaper cost. He obviously had no concern that religious private schools did not admit just anyone and kicked students to the side who did not meet their standards. (An ICEF charter gave exactly that reason for sending to a public school a student with emotional disability, expecting me to do what it would not.) Nor did he look at public schools, even in the worst-off neighborhoods, that produced successful individuals. Evidently, all he saw were the average scores for a school and took this to mean something.
Driving to the school in which I taught in L. A., I passed the former Goodyear Plant, one block from the school. It remained an empty lot for many of my 17 years at that school. Finally the central Post Office constructed a new building and moved in. What does this say about the neighborhood and opportunity? Meanwhile, many students were successful, in spite of Florencia 13, the crack epidemic, and a lack of jobs that paid well.
I am more appalled by the ignorance of the defenders of private charters living off public money than I am of all those Florencia 13 members. In the late 60’s people like me who worked in these schools were called poverty pimps for wanting to provide for my family while performing a service. What has happened to that term in regard to the wealthy who increase their wealth by being poverty pimps? (And pimp in its original meaning.)
This morning there is an editorial in the L. A. Times, trying to put lipstick on the pig of these selective charters. Pimping the pimp?
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The maps of US school districts with indicators of poverty published by EdBuild and reported in the Washington Post August 24, 2015 certainly tell a sad story, but not the whole story.
An earlier story about these maps, published in the Washington Post July 8, 2015, puts the poverty map project in perspective, including who is leading the initiative and who is funding it. http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/local/wp/2015/07/08/poverty-rates-in-every-u-s-school-district-in-one-map/
The maps are produced and circulated under the auspices of EdBuild. EdBuild is funded by eight organizations known to be unfriendly to public education. Among them are:
1. The Peter and Carmen Lucia Buck Foundation. Funds charter schools, Students First, Teach for America, and other versions of “reform.”
2. The Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation. Funds charter and online schools, promotes pay-for-performance and corporate-style training for administrators in education.
3. The Walton Family Foundation. A major source of funding for charter school startups and expansions.
4. The CityBridge Foundation. This Foundation is a supporter/partner of TFA, KIPP, other charters, and on-line education. CityBridge also claims “thought leaders” for its work. Many of these promote charter schools, online education, and destabilization of public education. Among the “though leaders” for CityBridge are the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation, Thomas B Fordham Institute, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, New Schools Venture Fund, and Walton Family Foundation.
5. The Carnegie Corporation of New York. Funds charter schools, New Teacher Project, New Schools Venture Fund among other programs.
6. Bellwether Education Partners is public relations firm, serves as a conduit of money for projects from corporate and private foundations and organizations that, in the main, promote for profit schools, charter and online schools, performance pay. Bellwether has received at least $6 million in operating support and other grants from the Gates Foundation. A recent white paper recommends state waivers of teacher education requirements, pay for performance, putting districts in charge of “human capital pipeline” for education, including teacher education.
7. Forward Progress in Politics Founded in 2012 by Kahlil Byrd, a former NPR journalist, the inaugural president of Rhee’s Students First. Forward Progress in Politics is a private investment firm promoting social impact bonds (SIBs) a relatively new financial product, where money raised by investors (private or philanthropic) is used for a public objective. The investors are repaid with public funds, plus a decent return on their investment, if that objective is met. An intermediary group manages the project, can fire the service providers, set targets for performance and so on. SIBs, also known as pay-for-success contacts are a strategy for diverting public funds to private investors usually with a return of 5% to 7% for investors.
8. Center for American Progress. Fans of pay-for-performance, Broad Foundation initiatives, Common Core and associated tests for teacher evaluation
The CEO of EdBuild is Rebecca Sibilia whose LinkedIn profile offers a muddy account of her role in EdBuild.
According to LinkedIn, she participated in the “creation of EdBuild” while she was President of Washington DC-based Resources and Strategies, LLC, (July 2005 – September 2009). LinkedIn (Sibilia) describes that version of EdBuild as, “a venture capital project to utilize charter school facility funding and practices to renovate District of Columbia Public Schools buildings, in partnership with the New Schools Venture Fund.” While President of Resources and Strategies, Sibilia also “assisted in the planning and start-up of several charter schools, including creation of 5-year plans, financial projections and resource development plans.”
So, the initial idea of EdBuild was connected with property renovation aided by venture capital, focused on public school buildings in DC and during the tenure of Michelle Rhee, Chancellor of the DC schools 2007-2010.
Sibilia’s next job, coincidently, is at Michelle Rhee’s newly formed Students First where , According to LinkedIn she is Chief Operating Officer and VP of Fiscal Strategy. (Students First website does not list her in this role, but it does have a link to EdBuild)
So, according to Sibilia’s muddy LinkedIn bio, she founded EdBuild in 2014— this is after “helping to create it” in 2005.
In any case, Rebecca Sibilia has put together the current version of EdBuild with help from five StudentsFirst colleagues, all working on the “redesign” of school finance, and better workforce management, and funding “equity” meaning federal, state, and local funding follows the student.
See more on all of this at https://deutsch29.wordpress.com/2015/05/29/studentsfirsts-rebecca-sibilia-and-her-charters-little-helper-edbuild/
My bottom line impression is this: The maps are extremely useful to show the appalling increase in the number of school districts that can be defined by rates of poverty.
But they maps do absolutely nothing to address that issue.
Given the available information about the origin of EdBuild maps, the current funders of EdBuild, and the interests of EdBuild, the maps are a tool for EdBuild and friends to:
1) privatize education in these locationscontinuing the myth that charter schools are public schools,
2) leave unaddressed the reasons for these concentrated areas of poverty and their influence on education,
3) exploit these communities as profit centers for venture and vulture capitalists, with “social impact bonds” helping to erode the strength and independence of local social service agencies and public schools with elected school boards.
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And I wonder, rhetorically, how could VAM models possibly account for downward economic trends during the school year and its specific impacts on different neighbothoods? We sometimes see the impacts long after the fact in flights, closings and crime statistics.
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