The Washington Post’s Valerie Strauss writes about a new report from ETS (Educational Testing Service) that sheds light on the economic and educational effects of poverty. Writes Strauss,
“The report also discusses modern education reform and its effects on the educational outcomes for poor children. It says that reform that fails to address the issue of poverty has so far failed to do much to improve student achievement among poor children:
Education policies and reform efforts have shifted over the past several decades. Emphasis has shifted away from providing more equitable and adequate funding for schools and targeted services for disadvantaged students and toward policies directed at developing and implementing common core standards, improving teacher quality through the design and implementation of quantitative evaluation metrics, widespread use of test-based accountability systems, and providing wider-ranging choice among traditional district schools, charter schools, and through private school vouchers.
Yet, there exists little evidence that these reform strategies can substantially reduce the influence of poverty on educational opportunity, especially when they fail to address concurrently children’s readiness for school and the availability of equitable and adequate funding for high-poverty schools and districts.”
