LearnmoreMN Blog

The achievement gap: not someone else's problem

By Mike Ciresi, March guest blogger

The achievement gap that exists between our K-12 students of color and white students will have profound effects on higher education in the state in the coming years and, therefore, on our economy unless we work diligently to close the gap. If we do that, we will help ensure that our students are ready for college and the workforce of the 21^st century.

In a state that boasts the highest ACT scores in the nation, 40 percent of our high school graduates entering public colleges and universities require some type of developmental course in math or English or science. Many are students of color. The achievement gap in K-12 has led to what many experts call a college-readiness gap.

Our colleges and universities have to spend millions of dollars on these courses.

Now consider that by 2018, 70% of the jobs in Minnesota will require some post-secondary education. There will be fewer jobs for people without a high school diploma and those jobs won’t pay enough to support a family. Our businesses will need highly trained and highly skilled workers to compete nationally and globally.

On an individual level, a college graduate earns $650,000 more over a 40-year career than a high school grad, according to the Pew Research Center.

Add to that the changing demographics of the state. For example, Minneapolis is now 40% people of color. In a few decades, the state’s largest city will be majority people of color. If the achievement gap persists, we will as a community leave behind a generation of young people and we will shortchange what our businesses need to grow and prosper in a highly competitive world.

But if we begin to close the achievement gap and graduate students of color at the same rate as white students (in Minneapolis, for example, fewer than half the students of color graduate on time), we can add $1.3 billion annually to our state’s economy by 2020. And better educated residents will mean less reliance on social programs, lower crime rates, higher rates of voting and volunteering, and more students prepared for college and high-skilled jobs.

We should applaud efforts such as the recently announced GradMinnesota initiative, co-chaired by Lt. Governor Yvonne Prettner Solon and Education Commissioner Brenda Cassellius. The initiative seeks to increase the current high school graduation rate in Minnesota from 77 to 90% by 2020.

As I mentioned in my post earlier this month, the Minneapolis Foundation, with a host of community partners, has launched “RESET Education,” a public awareness campaign aimed at closing the achievement gap. It emphasizes five successful strategies that are working effectively in some Minneapolis district and public charter schools and in schools around the country. RESET stands for: Real-time use of data; Expectation not Excuses; Strong Leadership; and Effective Teaching and Time on Task. Business leaders, educators and parents can get involved and help make a difference. Many colleges are already working closely with local high schools and middle schools and their students.

The achievement gap is not someone else’s problem. It is our problem. And we must solve it sooner, not later, for the sake of our K-12 students, who are our future college students and high-skilled workers. Find out more about RESET Education and what you can do to make a difference.

How do we stop a workforce shortage?

By Kathy Schmidlkofer, March guest blogger

My last blog post challenged you to be an ambassador for our higher education system. But we need to do more. Our world-class workforce is one of our best regional assets, but threats to this status are certainly looming. Our region is currently experiencing a skills mismatch between our talent and the needs of our employers. This national trend is expected to continue. The big question is how do we turn this situation around so we have the right workforce prepared for the jobs of the future? I work for an organization trying to drive jobs and capital investment to our region so my sincere hope is that we can maintain the competitive advantage our workforce gives us.

The challenge of the future is two-fold in our region. We have a significant disparity in educational attainment between whites and our ethnic minority communities. In addition, while post-secondary institutions in the state are producing many graduates, they are not meeting private-sector demand in high-growth STEM fields (science, technology, engineering and math). Aligning degrees with needed skills will be critical to promoting individual success and economic growth. Site selectors tell us that the number one criterion for companies looking to place jobs is the availability, talent, and skill level of the workforce so, to maintain the economic vitality of this region, we cannot afford to ignore this workforce shortage.

Key demographic trends are disturbing given the need for a more educated workforce. The recent Compass report by the Wilder Foundation said the state’s population is getting older, more diverse, has a widening income gap, and educational disparities that start early and continue.

While more than four of five white, non-Hispanic high school students in Minnesota graduate on time, just over half of students of color do, according to the report. However, in an encouraging sign, the graduation rate for students of color has risen more than 10 percentage points since 2003.

Education levels will have a direct impact on the economic health of our region’s residents. Unemployment rates go down as educational attainment rises. As the demand for highly skilled workers has increased so has the wage premium of higher education. In 1975, bachelor’s degree holders earned 57% more than high school graduates. In 2007, they earned 83% more.

Employers need to play a key role in communicating their future needs to the higher education establishment. This is especially true of fields where they expect growth as well as the need for broader skill sets. Jobs today are demanding a more flexible skillset: Employers report that communication, reading comprehension, critical thinking, and ability to learn are key skills they seek in employees. As workforce needs change, perhaps employers also will be challenged to consider filtering students differently. Rather than filtering by the prestige of a graduate’s academic institution and specific degree, employers may need to review how they assess a candidate’s specific skills such as the ability to communicate, problem solving, leadership, and critical reasoning skills.

Educators already are aware of the challenges ahead and are working toward solutions. At GREATER MSP, our Partnership Advisory Council has made turning around the workforce shortage a priority and its members are working with MnSCU and other education organizations and businesses throughout the region to address and solve the mismatch.

Knowing that this workforce shortage could get worse without substantive action, I turn the question to you: What else should be done?

We must dismantle the school to prison pipeline in Minnesota

A Call to Action

By Nekima Levy-Pounds, May guest blogger

Teachers, administrators, and parents are often unaware of the critical role that school policies play in determining whether a child is on his or her way to college or prison. In Minnesota, children as young as 10 years old may be incarcerated in a juvenile detention facility for violating the law. Minnesota is also one of eight states with the greatest rates of racial disparities within its juvenile justice system.

Disturbingly, roughly 25% of referrals to the juvenile justice system are made by schools. According to the Children’s Defense Fund, African American children are over-represented amongst those in the juvenile justice system. This carries with it a whole host of consequences, including high rates of trauma experienced by children in detention, a greater likelihood of adult criminality and difficulty reintegrating back into society after being released from detention.

Although some may feel that if you “do the crime, you should do the time,” the lines between childish antics and criminality are often blurred when it comes to conduct that occurs on school premises. For example, when I was a student in school, a school fight would likely result in suspension or in extreme cases, expulsion. Now, when a school fight occurs, the youths involved in the fight may be referred to the school resource officer, who in turn may take the youths to the juvenile detention center (JDC).

Once a child is taken to the JDC, he or she may spend one or more nights locked in secure detention. The child will then have to appear before a judge, be appointed legal counsel and make grown-up decisions; with or without the involvement of a parent throughout the process. Although many believe that a child’s juvenile record disappears when the child turns 18, this is not often the case, as some juvenile records remain accessible until a child’s 28th birthday. As such, employers and landlords are frequently unwilling to hire someone with a juvenile history. Once this occurs, the child will more likely dive deeper into the criminal justice system and have little hope for breaking the cycle of incarceration.

In order to dismantle the school to prison pipeline in Minnesota, we must ensure that the JDC is reserved for only those youths who need to be there. Schools must become more selective about making referrals to the system and find creative and less damaging ways to address misbehavior on the part of students.

For more information, see Children’s Defense Fund, Cradle to Prison Pipeline Campaign.

Early Childhood Education: Head Start is Not Enough

By Kate Bristol, April Guest Blogger

Macalester College — where I am a student — convened a Mayor's Forum in February to discuss best practices in education. The policymakers and educators who attended help shape the educational systems in many Minnesotan towns. One of the topics covered by the Forum was pre-kindergarten programs — which are vital in putting kids on a path to school success.

Data shows that investment in pre-kindergarten programs pays off, but we have yet to invest in these programs statewide. While districts claim that they lack funding, combining federal funding with an investment from local corporations would be sufficient to start up a pre-k classroom. We know what to do; we know how to do it; now all we have to do is take action.

To maximize high-quality preschool access for low-income students, I suggest the following changes to the federal preschool program:

1. Assist suboptimal programs to meet these standards.
2. Provide funding to hire qualified teachers and for ongoing teacher education.
3. Recruit the 40 percent of eligible children who are not currently enrolled in the Head Start.
4. Expand eligibility criteria of Head Start to include children of families living at the 125 percent Federal Poverty Level
5. Support recruitment of all eligible three-year-olds.
6. Mandate public preschool programs in all 50 states to provide greater access to children of families living at 150 percent
7. Establish minimum quality standards for all public preschool programs to improve kindergarten readiness.

Paying for the approximately five million additional children who would become eligible under this proposal may seem staggering. However, state and federal governments would share the financial burdens. The long-term benefits to our society of high-quality preschools are enormous. There is an astounding benefit-to-cost ratio of seventeen to one. There would be higher rates of education, employment, income, and marriage; and lower rates of delinquency, crime and drug use.

As a nation, we cannot afford to do otherwise.

Issues Before the Achievement Gap

By Josie Johnson, March 2008 Guest Blogger

On May 17 we will celebrate the 54th year since the Supreme Court settled the question in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, does segregation of children in public schools solely on the basis of race, even though the physical facilities and other tangible factors may be equal, deprive the children of the minority group of equal educational opportunity? “We believe that it does,” the Court said.

Thurgood Marshall, the chief NAACP Legal Defense lawyer at the time of the decision, believed that the American Dream could be made to work for Black people as well as whites. He did not believe that the system was flawed and deeply etched with the effects of segregation and the laws of segregation which had denied Black children equal education opportunities.

Some historians have written that Marshall, the NAACP lawyers and the Black community were convinced that the Supreme Court decision guaranteed Black children the education their parents and communities had suffered and died for since 1865.

The dream of true emancipation through education continues to elude our Black community. It has become clear that the issues facing Black parents and Black communities are larger than simply the condition of the schools or transportation. They are more subtle and insidious.

In many schools, Black children are taught by teachers who believe them to be inferior and, therefore, treat them that way. The same teachers teach white children that they are superior. Curiously, the degree to which Black children are experiencing this from teachers has increased since the enforcement of Brown. Many Black children are forced to fight their way rather than learn their way through school in an effort to gain some sense of self-respect.

In many communities, experienced Black teachers have been removed from classrooms with large numbers of Black students where they served as models and have either been “promoted” to an administrative position or reassigned to a white majority school.

Furthermore, teachers are offered pay incentives classified as combat pay, to accept teaching assignments in schools in Black majority neighborhoods. All of these behaviors and policies perpetuate institutionalized racism which is etched deeply into the American social fabric.

One year after the historic May 1954 decision, renowned scholar and historian, Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois, predicted that it would force Black people to face:

…a cruel dilemma…with successfully mixed schools they know what their children must suffer for years from southern white teachers, from white students who sit beside them and under school authorities from janitors to superintendents, who hate and despise them….They must eventually surrender race ‘solidarity’ and the idea of American Negro culture to the concept of world humanity, above race and nation. This is the price of liberty. This is the cost of oppression.

Unfortunately, Dr. Du Bois was accurate in predicting the experiences Black children would have in desegregated schools.

In today’s system our children are not being taught to function successfully in society. Their learning has been replaced by emphasis on the achievement gap. The U.S. Department of Education describes this gap as “the difference in academic performance between different ethnic groups.” The Department also states that the achievement gap is a multifaceted problem that requires examination from multiple perspectives. Some educators suggest it is the difference between a child’s potential and his/her actual achievement.

In my judgment, the challenge to help Black students reach that potential is, in part, the lack of knowledge about and respect for the Black student’s community’s relationship/history with education.  Neither the teachers nor our children know their history. They don’t know who they are, their relationship to education or, from whence they have come.

The gap is caused by disparities in information, resources, instruction, belief, commitment, quality and care. Our children are given medication, assigned to special classes for emotional or academic deficiencies, allowed to fall short of their potential rather than reach their potential.

We must pull together as a nation, if we are to survive. We must save all of our children and help them become the best they can be.

The society needs all its children to become successful, productive, happy citizens.

A different kind of glass ceiling…

By Willy Tully, February 2008 Guest Blogger

The barriers that prevent Minnesota students from enrolling in college are often erected well before the senior year of high school.

A study, conducted for the Minnesota State Legislature by Ghere, Moore, and Schelske in 1999, shows that, "students begin self-selecting for high academic achievement as early as third grade, and courses that students take in middle school and early in high school are closely related to future college attendance."

Choices relating to academic rigor and extracurricular participation, as well as peer influence, shape a student’s perception of what they can achieve. At the same time, reserved space in honors courses, the cost of summer programs, and a lack of knowledge about (or access to) postsecondary choices exacerbate the innate barriers. Underperforming middle school students are funneled into high school programs that are unchallenging and that will not provide the requisite spark needed to excite the passion for learning present in every young person.

In actuality, students are constructing their own ceiling as they progress through a K-12 education. The unfortunate parallel is that our educational system is designed to reinforce these limiting "self" selections.

This makes me angry, and I hope it makes you angry too.

Schools are under-funded, teachers and counselors are under-paid, there are abhorrent socioeconomic and racial disparities in education, and schools located just minutes from one another are miles apart in the quality and breadth of educational programming they can offer. But now is not the time to despair. Indeed, now is the time to repair and rebuild. We must champion community cooperation – we must be pioneers for freedom and equality in education.

With the tools and the might, we must reach up and shatter that glass ceiling, for the limitations posed on individuals prevent this community from reaching its truest potential – from reaching greatness. And greatness is possible.