LearnmoreMN Blog

Transforming education so all kids succeed

By MayKao Hang, June guest blogger

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan calls education the civil rights movement of our generation. "I think the dividing line in our country today is so much around educational opportunity. And we have to close that divide." In Minnesota, we pride ourselves on being progressive, focused on academic success, and being ahead of the curve. But, we are doing worse than other states in closing the achievement gap. In fact, recent data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) show Minnesota has the worst gap in the U.S. between white and African American students, falling behind Washington D.C., Alabama, and Mississippi.

One of 21 cities across the nation to receive a federal Promise Neighborhood Grant, Saint Paul is working to close the divide by organizing the community toward one common vision: that children are successful from cradle-to-career. We decided to look at the achievement gap as an opportunity gap. Let’s start with the premise that all children can be successful academically and work from there by setting the expectations high.

The Saint Paul Promise Neighborhood is a transformational opportunity to remove school success barriers. Spanning a 250-block area in the Frogtown and Summit-University neighborhoods, including two public elementary schools — Jackson and Maxfield, the area is young, with 32% of residents under age 18. It is poor; 56% of households have incomes below $35,000 and 89% of students are eligible for free or reduced lunch. Poverty is a leading indicator for who will fall into the achievement gap. Children who are sick, tired, hungry or fearful are not able to be attentive in the classroom.

Our approach with the Promise Neighborhood is to organize the community and create the will and means to realign education, health, public safety and human services to create an environment that supports all our children to achieve academic success. We have conducted a community assessment, and since fall, six Solution Action Groups — each made up of 20-25 Promise Neighborhood residents, service providers, educators and others — have been developing a plan of action.

We have learned from years of delivering direct services and through research that none of us can do this work alone. We must integrate the assets of the private and public sectors and use them to fuel academic success. Addressing the needs of a child is not enough — to be successful we must address the needs of their families, neighborhoods, and the environment in which children live and grow.

Since 1997, The Amherst H. Wilder Foundation has been a key partner with the Saint Paul Public Schools on the Achievement Plus program where we have successfully developed a standards-based curriculum, extended learning opportunities for students, and offered learning supports for students and families. At Dayton’s Bluff Elementary School, one of our Achievement Plus schools, Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment (MCA) test scores rose from 12% to over 60% in a 10-year period. The investments we make now in programs like Achievement Plus and Saint Paul Promise Neighborhood help remove barriers to learning and build a stronger Minnesota with well-educated and engaged citizens and a productive workforce. Children are our future; they deserve our best effort.

Calling it as I see it

Why the use of the term “achievement gap” makes a bad situation worse

By Nekima Levy-Pounds, May guest blogger

For years, we have invariably used the term “achievement gap” to describe educational disparities between white and black youths in Minnesota. It occurs to me that this term fails to accurately articulate the truth of why children of color are falling through the cracks within our public education system. For one, the term “achievement gap” is deficit-based language that implies that blame for children’s failure to “achieve” falls upon their own shoulders and is a result of their unwillingness or lack of motivation to work hard in school. (It is the Horatio Alger “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” myth in disguise.) However, for many children who struggle in school, external circumstances like chronic poverty and marginalization often hinder them from obtaining equal opportunities to achieve success.

For example, a child who has attended school in a wealthy suburban area typically receives advantages to which a poor child would not ordinarily be privy. The child in the wealthier community will likely gain access to more highly qualified teachers, newer textbooks, access to the latest technology, smaller class sizes, privately-financed extra-curriculars and inside knowledge of the unwritten customs and rules of mainstream society.

Meanwhile, a poor child of color is forced to contend with less qualified teachers, used or even no textbooks, lower teacher expectations, over-crowded classrooms, and a lack of racial diversity and cultural competence amongst teachers. Further, the recent report entitled: "Double Jeopardy: How Third- Grade Reading Skills and Poverty Influence High School Graduation" (Annie E. Casey Foundation) establishes that “children whose families live in poverty often lack resources for decent housing, food, clothing, and books, and they often do not have access to high quality child care and early education... .”

Rather than labeling the cumulative effects of these conditions as an “achievement gap,” I prefer the analysis provided by Carter G. Woodson, who wrote a book describing these issues in 1933, aptly called, The Mis-Education of the Negro.  Thus, I see the educational disparities as the result of “mis-education” or an “opportunity gap” experienced by poor children of color. In order to tackle these issues effectively, we have to provide equal access to educational opportunities, teachers qualified to teach poor children of color and language that accurately identifies the issues. In essence, the “achievement gap” rhetoric is a misnomer that sets us back, rather than pushes us forward in creating equal opportunities to succeed for all children.

Looking to the Mayo Clinic, and the "village" of Cincinnati, for comprehensive and collaborative models of education success

By Dane Smith, April guest blogger

As we strive toward our goals of much higher post-secondary attainment and reducing our racial and income achievement gaps, let’s consider the Mayo Clinic. This world-famous institution, a point of pride for Minnesota, might seem like a strange model for school improvements. But health care and medicine, like education, is fundamentally a human-helping-human enterprise. And the concept of healing is fitting as we try to address what ails our education system.

"The Mayo" earned its reputation by: considering the whole health of each patient in the most comprehensive way possible, dedication to the principle that "the needs of the patient always come first," coordinating the efforts of its entire group of doctors, and devoting much of its resources toward research and evidence, according to Wikipedia. (As the father of a daughter whose life was saved by Mayo’s collaborative expertise, I actually have firsthand knowledge of the Mayo formula.)

Similarly, we strongly believe that the ideal strategy for improving education investment in Minnesota must be comprehensive, student-centered, collaborative and evidence-based.

There actually is  a growing consensus nationally that the entire cradle-to-career pathway must be tended and improved, as outlined in a national "Broader, Bolder Approach," with its guiding principles for educational redesign. While we should demand improvement in K-12 teachers and principals and administrators, we are missing the boat completely if we neglect the fact that about half our kindergartners, mostly from low-income families and disadvantaged minority neighborhoods, are not fully ready to learn when those professionals first see them. And education must begin by better equipping new parents for their weighty responsibilities.

This or that "silver bullet" — school uniforms, alternative teacher licensure or merit pay, all-day kindergarten — are not likely all by themselves to move the needle dramatically on educational outcomes. And we simply can’t hope for this or that individual miracle-worker in the school system to save our struggling students. Rather, the African proverb "it takes a village to raise a child" comes to mind. And although that phrase might be a little overused in recent years, this very comprehensive and collaborative mindset was crucial to success over the last decade in Cincinnati.

The graduation rate for Cincinnati Public Schools district increased from 51% in 2000 to 80% in 2009. And the graduation rate differential between African-American students and white students not only narrowed to nearly equal standing in that time but has remained at similar levels since 2006. Achievement scores for the district improved significantly. And perhaps most important, college enrollment and readiness have bumped up too: colleges in the Cincinnati area are reporting that more of the city’s high school graduates are enrolling, and more students from the local area are entering academia prepared for the challenges — and staying in college.

The Cincinnati story truly was a group effort. Cincinnati’s success involved multiple interventions along the entire pathway, from cradle to career launch, not just one or two of those "silver bullets," such as lower class sizes, aggressive testing or assigning pass/fail grades to schools. And the overriding lesson is that the school district was not alone in its efforts to reform schools and improve achievement for all students. The local business and philanthropic community, parents and community groups, teachers unions and even national experts on school change (including Minnesota’s own Joe Nathan, director of the Center for School Change at Macalester College) played a key role. More about the Cincinnati experience is available on our website at Growth & Justice, which also features our own Smart Investments in Minnesota’s Students agenda and project, detailing a comprehensive, evidence-based strategy for driving Minnesota toward a 75% higher education attainment rate by the end of this decade.

Education has always been a public responsibility in Minnesota and the United States, for the very good reason that it is essential to our common good, our economy and the quality of life in our community. Education really is everybody’s business, extends well beyond the school and before and after the school day. Mayo and Cincinnati teach us that comprehensive and collaborative are the right way to meet this responsibility.

Calling for a constellation of ideas on closing the achievement gap

By Margaret Anderson Kelliher, January guest blogger

I will not pretend to be a professionally licensed educator, but I come from a long line of teachers starting with my great grandmother. She was educated at what was then Mankato Normal School, now Minnesota State Mankato, and taught in a one-room school house. My mother was an art teacher at North St. Paul High School for a stint in the late 1940s. And I have developed and taught a course at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey School of Public Affairs on negotiation for the last couple of years.

Having teaching in my genes often makes me wonder what exactly makes a great teacher. How does innovation in teaching and learning happen?

This question has led me to an author who has written on the topic of innovation. Steven Johnson’s book, Where Good Ideas Come from: a Natural History of Innovation, contains lessons for educators, parents, students, inventors and entrepreneurs. Johnson lays out a few important concepts that are important to the genesis of good ideas and how good ideas grow, improve and take hold. I think one of the most important points of the book, which is applicable to teaching and learning, is “idea as a network” and the expansion that takes place when an idea is networked. Johnson calls this chapter “Liquid Networks.” He lays out key components of a network: it needs to be densely populated — like the billions of neurons in your brain; and plastic — able to adjust to new situations. When an idea is alone it is likely to die — it needs other ideas and concepts to crash into to form more fully.

The work of McGill University psychologist Kevin Dunbar is highlighted by Johnson. Dunbar went out and watched scientists in their labs and conducted interviews. He refers to this approach as in vivo (in the wild) — the wild of science labs. His findings are striking. He found that it was rare to have discovery happen in a single moment with a single scientist, but that the most important ideas emerged at the conference table where ideas were shared.

To improve teaching and learning we need more shared moments of ideas, observations, data and connections. To close the achievement gap in Minnesota we need more master teachers sharing their ideas with one another school by school. Too often we over-emphasize the individual teaching star or student, but what we really need to create is the conditions for the Milky Way — constellations of ideas that create the network of success for teachers, and ultimately for students.

For Minnesota to have the next breakthrough in medical devices, genomics research or food science we need more conference tables. To improve the outcomes in teaching and learning we need more time together and less time apart. If we care about the good ideas and innovation — we can start today. Circle the chairs around the table and discuss the ideas, theories and outcomes and we can leap forward.

Motivating kids is key to their success

By Kent Pekel, September guest blogger

How does Minnesota move beyond admiring the problem of the gaping gaps in educational achievement and attainment that persist in our state along racial and socioeconomic lines? That was one of the questions I had the opportunity to pose last night to more than 100 community members who gathered to watch a preview screening of a new TPT documentary, “Challenging Expectations.” The program offers a compelling overview of the urgent need to put students from groups that have long been underrepresented in higher education — especially students of color and low-income students — on the path to success at technical, community and four-year colleges.

The program describes many of the changes that schools, colleges and community partners need to make to reach that goal, from increasing access to challenging high school classes to providing mentors and support systems for students who face challenges beyond the classroom. Carlos Mariani Rosa — legislator and head of the Minnesota Minority Education Partnership — spoke about the need for systemic responses combined with individual commitment and community leadership. He also suggested that we need many more non-profit organizations like Admission Possible and publicly supported initiatives like the federal TRiO programs.

I agree with Carlos about the need for systemic reforms and supports, but I was most struck by the conversation afterward about another critical part of the formula for academic success: student motivation. Time and again, we heard students who were succeeding against the odds say they had a fire in the belly to make their way to college and a career. Some of those students said that motivation came from a family member, others drew it from a mentor or teacher and still others had no idea where it originated.

As I reflected last night on my years as a K-12 teacher and administrator, I realized that despite the fact that my colleagues and I were deeply committed to student success, no school or district I worked in had a formal strategy to increase and sustain students’ motivation to succeed in school. Instead, we assumed that strong relationships and good teaching would result in the motivation to learn. For many students, those things are enough. But my experience in recent years and the “Challenging Expectations” program reinforce my sense that schools and organizations that work with youth now need to put in place proactive and powerful strategies for motivating students to succeed in school and progress toward higher education and high-skill employment.

And so the question in my mind today is this: what would that look like? How can we do more than hope that students develop the persistence to work through academic and personal challenges to reach their goals? How can we help young people who tweet and text all day develop the willingness to undertake the “boring” work that is required to learn to perform a science experiment, write a great essay or create a great work of art?

What programs and educators are already doing this, what can we learn from them and how do we replicate them across Minnesota? We need to stop admiring the problem of the achievement gap and start solving it at scale for all of our students and in all of our communities.

Achievement Gap and Poverty

By John Fitzgerald, April guest blogger

I recently wrote an essay for Minnesota 2020 about the achievement gap. My goal was to bring to light new figures that show the gap still exists and has not changed for the better.

The achievement gap is most often seen through the lens of race — that is, how do minority students compare to white students? In Minnesota, they fare quite poorly. In 1992, white fourth-grade students scored 223 on a National Assessment of Educational Progress test while African American students scored 189, a gap of 34 points. Fifteen years later, that gap was 33 points. In eighth-grade math, white students scored 277 in 1990 and African Americans 236 — a gap of 41 points. In 2007, that gap was 37 points.

But race isn’t the only way to look at the achievement gap. Significant differences can be seen between those children who live in poverty and those who do not.

More than 30 percent of Minnesota students qualify for free and reduced price school lunch, the federal standard for poverty. There was a gap in the reading test of 30 points between fourth-graders from high-income families and low-income families in 1998. That gap was 27 points in 2007. Minnesota’s low-income fourth-graders rank 31st in the country in test scores.

The situation is worse in the eighth-grade math test. What was a 19-point difference in 2000 is a 25-point difference in 2007.

What’s the answer to the achievement gap? Heck if I know. I am often reminded of the saying “A war is won with boots on the ground.” I suspect that the achievement gap problem — vast and nationwide — will require a solution that includes increased manpower to reach out to students in danger of becoming achievement gap statistics. We simply must not allow these students to fail.

Latinos engage on education policy issues

By Rogelio Muñoz, March guest blogger

During President Barack Obama’s first address to the nation last month, he called for Americans to be more civically engaged in their communities on issues important to them. The president emphasized the significance of what we each can do when we unite, mobilize, and work together. In Minnesota, that charge has been the essence of Latino civic engagement for generations and today it is no different.

Shortly after the 2009 Legislative Session convened in early January, the state’s Latino community participated in the 2009 Latino Legislative Day at the Capitol. The event, organized by the state’s Chicano Latino Affairs Council, was the first in modern history to bring Latinos together under one united voice to support a multi-issue policy agenda.  With some 200 Latino community members, leaders, supporters, and longtime advocates, the day at the Capitol addressed the council’s priorities for the 2009 Legislative Session and important policy issues for Minnesota’s Latino community, such as Pre K-12 education, higher education, and health. 

On the issue of education in the state, Latino students in public schools continue to be impacted by the achievement gap across all subject areas and have the lowest graduation rate. Currently, Minnesota’s minority communities or people of color comprise more than 14 percent of the total state population. When you compare this percentage to students of color in our public schools, the percentage is much higher at 24 percent or almost one-fourth of the total student enrollment. Further, Minnesota’s total Latino population is at 4 percent (208,000) while it is surpassed by the total Latino student enrollment at 6.1 percent (51,000). What does this say? Clearly, the state’s Latino community is younger and growing fast.

During the Latino Legislative Day at the Capitol, 25 teams organized and led by Latino community leaders, met with state legislators to brief them on the needs of Latino students. View their recommendations 

Minnesota must meet the needs of Latino students in public schools and prepare them for higher education. It’s important to our community and to the state. 

Root cause of the achievement gap

Posted by moderator

In Part Two of his article, At-Risk Sur-Thrival Begins Deep-Down In The Mind, Jon Pekel shares his view of the achievement gap. Here’s an edited excerpt.

“In my view, all too many well-meaning youth programs jump right to throwing time and money at solutions, without carefully defining the underlying root cause of the problem for which their solution, supposedly, is a corrective action. That’s why when I founded MyGrowthPlan.Org four years ago I spent months reviewing the achievement gap research and literature. Gradually, I came to the conclusion that the primary root cause of the achievement gap is NOT found in:

1. The low socio/economic status of some people of color
2. The still oppressive White mainline culture – that is, in white racism
3. Poorly performing teachers and schools, or in the
4. Inherent intellect or learning deficiencies of students of color.

Rather, in my view, the primary underlying root cause of the domestic and international achievement gap is found in some relatively recent, highly negative American youth development MINDSET values, beliefs, and attitudes & LIFESTYLE behaviors and practices. And, while our entire American culture exhibits some aspects of these negative youth development qualities, I believe they are particularly strong in some (but not all) segments of the Black and Latino communities, and in some segments of the White and Asian communities. But, as with earlier American sub-cultures, I believe these negative youth development orientations and practices are temporary and very fixable … if they are specifically identified, admitted, and addressed.”

Do you agree with this view of the primary root cause of the achievement gap?

Read the full article and share your comments here.

Is the achievement gap caused by our culture?

Posted by moderator

We've posted a new article about a planning service for at-risk high school and college students on the LearnmoreMN site. Jon Pekel, president of MyGrowthPlan.org, states in his article that our pop culture has had an adverse impact on many youth and their families.

"...I believe our profit-driven mass media pop culture...is highly toxic, systematically undermining the development of our youth's highly vulnerable, still under construction teen brain, mind and resulting everyday lifestyle."

In Pekel's view, the achievement gap stems in part from a mass media influence that promotes negative values, beliefs, attitudes and lifestyle practices. He proposes a model that focuses on continuous growth planning versus a "street survival" (just let life happen) orientation. His practical suggestions include better role modeling by parents and educators and changes to our youth development practices. What do you think?

Read his article and share your comments here.

Response to "Vanishing Graduates & Minnesota's Future"

By Katherine Bristol, April Guest Blogger

Minnesota is a prosperous place; the state ranks highly in many social and economic indicators.  The state’s  affluence can be traced to wise investment and policy decisions made by past generations.  However, as we progress into the 21st century, this prosperity is not guaranteed.  In order to be competitive globally, Minnesota needs a highly‐skilled workforce.  Regrettably, several indicators of educational attainment demonstrate that the state is not meeting this standard.  This is especially true for communities of color, which comprise a major source of future workers.  And while Minnesota has the third highest high school completion rate among all states, following high school, about 65 percent of Minnesotans enroll in postsecondary education.  Sustaining this high rate will be a challenge for Minnesota’s high schools and postsecondary institutions.

The total number of high school graduates is projected to decline by 10 percent from 2005 to 2010.  This will occur as children of the baby boomers (“the boomlet”) move beyond the high school age.  According to the Minnesota Office of Higher Education, “Unless high school to college participation rates increase—especially among low‐income students, students of color and other students who are traditionally underrepresented in post‐secondary education — colleges will have a smaller pool of students from which to recruit (Minnesota Office of Higher Education 2006).”

“Vanishing Graduates” addresses the economic and social issues associated with a lower number of college graduates.  It got me thinking about what are some practical changes that could be made, without addressing widespread issues such as federal funding and teacher quality. I was able to come up with two, based on my previous research and experience:

1. Set High Standards.  Minnesota must be a national leader in public education.  In order to accomplish this ambitious objective, every student, family, teacher, school, district and program must be held to the high standards.  These goals must be transparent to all, specific and measurable.  Although it may seem counterintuitive, setting high standards is key to improving outcomes for low‐income or minority students who begin school with significant deficits in cognitive, social, and academic skills.
2. Empower Communities, Schools and Individuals.  Empowerment at the community, school and individual levels bestows control to members of marginalized communities who have often been denied that privilege. That control fosters senses of ownership and pride.  When communities are empowered to be involved in their schools, schools are empowered to take control of their own resources, parents are empowered to take initiative in their children’s learning, and young people are empowered to get involved in their communities, the end result will be improved outcomes for students.

I would like to know your thoughts on these suggestions, or the show in general! Please feel free to post your opinion below in the comment section, and we can get the conversation about this important issue started!