Research confirms what many of us may already suspect when we look at our state's school report card: The standardized proficiency tests that politicians have designed to hold schools accountable are really only poverty indicators.
While test scores soar in wealthy suburbs, the scores of big city and remote rural schools are constantly labeled as "failing." Unfortunately, however, the politicians who want us to demand more of these "failing" schools don't help us with the real question: What is it about poverty that dooms children to failure? Until we consider the answers to this question, our society cannot close the achievement gap between poor and rich children.
Bonnie and Dale Johnson show us the connections in their new book High Stakes: Children, Testing, and Failure in American Schools: A Year in the Life of One Rural School and Its Children. The book is the weekly journal of these University of Louisiana at Monroe professors of education, who take a leave of absence during the 2000-2001 school year to re-experience what it is like to be elementary school teachers. Bonnie takes a job in third grade. Dale teaches fourth, a high-pressure position in 2000, when Louisiana had already begun holding back children who fail the Louisiana Educational Assessment Program (LEAP) test in fourth grade.
Redbud is the fictitious name of the real school and the real town in northwest Louisiana whose adult residents work, when they are employed, as prison wardens, fast-food employees, and chicken de-boners. Poverty is three times the national average. "The school has no library, no playground equipment, no counselor, no art classes, no hot water (except for a faucet in the teacher's lounge), inadequate window heating and cooling units, and no regular school nurse. There is no place for sick children to lie down. There is one telephone available for 72 staff and 611 children."
"The children often come to school hungry and leave nothing on their school breakfast and lunch trays . . . Wendice and Leon fall asleep . . . every day this week. Wendice is lethargic and has a deep cough. He complains of chest pains . . . Kanzah is crying again with a terrible toothache . . . The school nurse (who comes only on Tuesday mornings) checks his rotting, black molar. She tries to call his home, but the phone has been disconnected . . . "
On the Monday after Thanksgiving, Bonnie Johnson is called to the office to greet a new child: Gerald, who moved away from her class in September and has been to four different schools before returning to Redbud. And in mid February after truant officers have threatened to remove her from her grandmother's care, Yolanda comes back to school after missing 70 consecutive days.
Despite the challenges, the teachers notice steady improvement in children's pen-pal letters, celebrate their reading successes, and admire enthusiastic and ongoing exploration of words and idioms. Pressure over the LEAP Test grows intense in fourth grade after Christmas. Only six children pass the practice test, as some misnumber answers, others freeze in fear, some daydream. All seven special education students fail. In March on the first day of test week, "Kelvin vomits in his hands and runs to the bathroom. He does not complete the first section." Of the 118 children in fourth grade at Redbud, 64 succeed ? a 20 percent improvement from last year and a tribute to the hard work of students and dedicated teachers.
Certainly there is some good in the movement to raise academic expectations for all children and to set uniform standards. Increased accountability has caused the Cleveland City School District to revise its high school curriculum, for example, by paring the course offerings from 1,600 to 400, requiring that all students study algebra instead of a panoply of "business" math offerings, and eliminating out-dated classes like shoe repair and shorthand.
It is dangerous, however, for grade-promotion to depend on one test. We should remember that children realize their promise at their own pace, as they simultaneously learn to manage all the other challenges in their lives. Many respected educators believe children should rarely be held back; they can catch up as they move on, since concepts are re-introduced and reinforced repeatedly. Being held-back causes children to lose hope.
U.S. Representative Chaka Fattah (D-Penn.) has introduced a bill in Congress that names the connection between low-achievement and school funding. Fattah insists that, "The standards and accountability movement will succeed only if, in addition to standards and accountability, all schools have access to the educational resources necessary to enable students to achieve."
Bonnie and Dale Johnson hope for better times in Redbud. "The resilient
children of Redbud come to school eager to learn and filled with hope. They
exhibit compassion, selflessness, and a sense of humor. The children
are too young to know the score."
Jan Resseger is Minister for Public Education and Witness with the United Church of Christ's Justice and Witness Ministries in Cleveland, Ohio.