Standardized+Testing+and+the+Achievement+Gap

Albrecht, K. (2010, August 27). Closing the Racial Achievement Gap: It’s Time to Look Beyond the Classroom. //Psychology Today//. Retrieved November 24, 2010, from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/choke/201008/closing-the-racial-achievement-gap-it-s-time-look-beyond-the-classroom

This article by Dr. Sian Beilock discusses specifically the black-white achievement gap and proposes possible reasons due to life outside the classroom that could be majorly contributing to this gap in standardized test performance. Beilock addresses that through federal funds and the viewpoint of the government, teachers are being held mostly accountable for the results of students’ test scores. However, Beilock suggests a study done by a sociologist from New York, Patrick Sharkey, which suggests that life outside school could be a bigger contributor to black student performance being so much lower than white students. The study suggested that those students who must experience a homicide in their neighborhood could contribute to much lower academic achievement, which is almost always black students. Also, the constant news about and comparision between black and white test scores can actually in itself cause lower performance. The stereotype of black students performing so much lower is actually causing black students to continuously perform lower than white students. This article I felt was very informative because although it seems obvious, the life of students outside of school I feel is rarely discussed as a major contributor to the black-white achievement gap on standardized tests. The main “culprit” of lowered test scores is usually pinpointed at the teachers or school district itself, but this article shows that there are many hardships certain minority students must face outside of school that can greatly contribute to their lack of performance. I thought this article actually showed some nice insight into problems that maybe should be looked at more closely at as being linked to problems in school performance.

Braun, H., Chapman, L., & Vezzu, S. (2010, September 10). The Black-White Achievement Gap Revisited. //Education Policy Analysis Archives//. Retrieved November 24, 2010, from 0-vnweb.hwwilsonweb.com.helin.uri.edu:80/hww/results/external_link_maincontentframe.jhtml;hwwilsonid=GRGUHOLMWZK4DQA3DIMCFGOADUNGIIV0

This source contains the results of a fairly in-depth study done to compare the black-white achievement gap in ten states. The study went as far as to gather various information about public education in the ten states, from the average per pupil spending for each, teacher quality indicators, and of course standardized assessment results in the form of the NEAP test. The study also broke down its results based on poverty level. The information was gathered from urban schools, and test scores were actually compared for two "strata": the S1, or lower poverty stratum, and the S2 or higher poverty stratum. The study compared the achievement gap in terms of the two strata and at two different time periods, showing the change in gap over time. For most of the studied states, the gap shrank between 2000 and 2007, and for only a few did it either widen or stay the same. Maryland had the highest improvement, narrowing the gap from 47 points to 26 points. Texas was the only state to widen the gap, from 17 points to 18 points. The achievement gap was also compared for white and black students. The difference in test scores between the students showed an even higher gap than when the two poverty levels for each state were compared. The median gap for all states in 2000 was 34 points and this was only reduced to 29 points by 2007. In some of the ten states, the gap actually widened. The study then went on to compare both the poverty level achievement gap and the black white achievement gap, showing unsurprisingly that the widest achievement gaps were in the more poverty-stricken areas. This article was very useful in the sense that it provided solid research and statistics to show the achievement gap in numbers. Although it does not provide any opinion on or proposals on how to fix the achievement gap, it does an excellent job of breaking down the gap by both poverty level and between white and black students and providing solid data to illustrate this.

Haycock, K. (2001). Closing the Achievement Gap. //Educational Leadership//, //58//(6), 6-11.

The main idea of this article is to propose the most efficient way to close the achievement gap while also providing a lot of data and statistics comparing the performance of students of different races, as well as comparing that to different time periods. For example, one main point showed that between 1970 and 1988, the achievement gap was significantly narrowed (between black and white students it was cut in half and between whites and Latinos it was narrowed by one-third). However, during the 90s, this gap began to greatly widen again and is still a predominant problem today. The main focus of the article however is to describe the main ways to begin closing the achievement gap. One main point that seems to really stick out in this article states that a lack of educational standards in poverty-stricken schools is a main contributor to poor performance. Lack of challenging material has become one of the main reasons students in poor areas have such poor standardized test scores. The article also addresses “extra help” for students as being a way to improve performance. The little amount of time given in a school day is usually not sufficient for these low-performance schools, and time either before or after school, on weekend, or during the summer has already proven to be beneficial for certain school districts. Finally, the article addresses that the quality and performance of teachers needs to improve in order to improve the test scores of students. I thought this article was useful because it seems to address the problems generating the achievement gap and possible ways to narrow it in a very structured way. It gives a breakdown of the most common problems that seem to be affecting student performance. Although there is not a whole lot of insight in this article, it does have a lot of useful information to contribute, as well as organized statistics comparing the performance of students of different races and in different areas, even in those poverty-stricken areas where student performance seems to be improving.

Clemmitt, M. (2010, August 5). Fixing Urban Schools: Has No Child Left Behind helped minority students?. //CQ Researcher//. Retrieved November 24, 2010, from http://0-library.cqpress.com.helin.uri.edu/cqresearcher/document.php?id=cqresrre2007042700&type=hitlist&num=0

This article takes a look at the performance of minority students post No Child Left Behind. The main consensus seems to be that NCLB is simply not fixing the existing problem of the achievement gap between white students and minority students on standardized tests. Along with this, any gains that do seem to have been made cannot be credited to NCLB and instead are a result of a more long-term trend. The article also includes some fairly shocking statistics, such as that in a middle-class predominantly white public school, there is a 1 in 4 chance of that school producing good test scores, compared to the only 1 in 300 chance an urban, predominantly minority public school. The article blames some well-known problems for poor performance among minorities, including lack of extra help such as tutoring, student mobility (students constantly being uprooted and moved around due to an unstable home life), as well as other factors such as poor health, no transportation, or having other responsibilities such as caring for siblings which hinder the ability for the student to attend school altogether. However, the article also shows other viewpoints, which argue that these outside reasons should not be used to justify the poor performance of the school itself. Teacher commitment also seems to be somewhat of an issue, since teaching in urban schools is usually more energy training and time consuming than teaching in a suburban school district.

I thought this article was great because not only did it focus on urban schools and address the issues surrounding them, but it seemed to give viewpoints from all sides which is useful in understanding all of the possible problems contributing to the achievement gap. It also gives real-life examples, such as directly quoting an urban student and discussing her probable reasons for having so much difficulty in performing well academically. It also gives a lot of solid data and statistics as well as using this information to discuss the effectiveness of the No Child Left Behind act.

Tehrani, A. (2007, May 24). How to Fix No Child Left Behind. //TIME//. Retrieved November 24, 2010, from http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1625192,00.html

This article goes fairly in-depth into the No Child Left Behind act: what it is, what it requires, opinions on its effectiveness, and how it should be changed. One point I found interesting is the idea that the AYP system put forth is somewhat of a do or die system, which is actually putting some schools behind. For example, the article discusses a California middle school in which 92% of the students are either black or Hispanic. The AYP system essentially put the school into high gear, and great improvements were seen in their standardized test scores. However, the school still did not meet their AYP goal because the test scores in the reading area were not quite up to par. In some California schools, this means sending students to other schools, which in turn takes away funding from areas where it could be more beneficial in order to bus students elsewhere. This is regardless of the progress the school may have made, because it did not quite reach the AYP goal. The growth model however measures achievement in a different way than AYP, in which students are measured more based on their improvement rather than where they stand compared to an average. The article goes on to discuss various viewpoints on the issue as well as discuss how schools are changing their standards and what subject matters are focused on primarily due to standardized testing, and whether this is a good or bad thing.

This article was very informative because it certainly looked primary at the No Child Left Behind act and the effects it is making on public school performance in America, both positive and negative. It also states various ways in which NCLB could take a different approach in order to further make gains in public school performance.

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