Wide Achievement Gap Still Divides Connecticut Students
GAP
The Hour
Anthony Rotunno
Boston University Washington News Service
3/1/07
WASHINGTON, March 1 – Despite being recognized for having one of the nation’s 10 highest rates of academic achievement among the 50 states, the Connecticut public school system still has some of the nation’s widest ethnic and income-based achievement gaps, according to a new report by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
After the report was issued on Wednesday, Connecticut Department of Education officials admitted to having “one of the largest achievement gaps in the nation,” and said fixing the problem remains one of their top priorities.
“The achievement gap in Connecticut is pronounced and statewide,” said Thomas Murphy, a spokesman for the department. “If you look at any district you will see an achievement gap between poor and non-poor students and white and minority students.”
The Chamber of Commerce report graded student academic achievement by comparing the scores of fourth and eighth graders in each state to the national averages scored in the 2005 National Assessment of Educational Progress, a nationwide math and reading exam.
Connecticut received an A for overall academic achievement, but its achievement levels for minority and low-income students received a D.
The report identified a need for better teachers, more innovative educational systems, better data collection methods and better management systems in public schools across the country. By applying business practices in areas like management and data collection, states can improve their education systems, according to Thomas Donohue, president and CEO of the Chamber of Commerce.
“The private sector is essential to tapping the potential of our educators and our schools,” he said.
But if states want to improve their students’ performance in the classroom, focusing on external variables like management and data collection is not the most effective way, according to Salvatore Corda, superintendent of Norwalk Public Schools.
Instead, he said, concentrating on classroom interaction between teachers and students is the most efficient way to improve academic performance.
“There is a fundamental misunderstanding on how you improve student performance,” Corda said. “Concentrate on the work. The more you concentrate on the core the greater the probability is you will be able to improve performance.”
The achievement gap between white and minority students has very little to do with race, Corda said, and everything to do with socioeconomic status. But it often gets placed in a racial context because many children from poorer families happen to be minorities, he said.
Bridging the achievement gap can not be done by simply increasing the states’ education spending per pupil, the state agency’s Murphy said. Students who live in poverty are often deprived of educational resources that their peers from wealthier families have access to, he said.
“One of the areas we neglect is the recognition that, for the most part, youngsters who come from poor families do not have the same access to experience, to language and to nurturing,” Corda said of the advantages low-income students lack. “They find themselves entering school behind those who have had these experiences.”
It is impossible to address the issue of minority and low-income students falling further behind in Norwalk public schools without addressing the social implications behind the statistics, according to the Rev. Lindsay Curtis, pastor of Grace Baptist Church and a board member of the Connecticut Coalition for Achievement Now, a statewide organization working to narrow the achievement gap.
“You can’t look at this whole query of why kids aren’t doing well and why it breaks along racial, cultural and economic divides without considering the social side of it,” Curtis said.
Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s proposed 2008 budget provides more than $1 billion for schools with large achievement gaps, Murphy said, as well as support for special education, after-school programs and more rigorous course curricula.
The state’s limited financial resources will ultimately dictate how much money is given to the public school systems in the coming year, Corda said. Fixing Connecticut’s achievement gap will require not only a financial commitment, he said, but a political and moral commitment as well.
“We can overcome these variables,” Corda said. “This issue is one of political will, but I do not believe that this country is ready to do that.”
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