Many of us — teachers, parents, policymakers, business leaders — have been wringing our hands at the Oct. 30th release of the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) scores —also known as “the nation’s report card.” And rightfully so.
The NAEP report reveals not only a stagnation in average reading and math scores over the past decade, but “a growing divergence in achievement between the highest and lowest achieving students.” The children who most bear the brunt of of this divergence — those who live in poverty — are the very children who most need a strong education so that the poverty of their childhood does not become the poverty of their adulthood, and is not passed on to their next generation. This is really bad news for all of us. Read more>>