Achievement Gap

With the institution of our Grosse Pointe High Schools 2.0 initiative, we have made some real strides towards closing the achievement gaps that exist between our highest and lowest achieving students. The research in a recent article (abstracted below) supports the initiatives we have put in place, and also provides parents with a kind of road map as to what school practices can have a negative impact on children. Your comments are welcome:

How the Achievement Gap Widens – and How to Close It

In this Kappan article, author/consultant Kim Marshall begins with a list of ways that an evil superintendent could expand the differences with which five-year-olds enter school so there would be an enormous achievement gap by high-school graduation:a. Tell principals and teachers that differences in students’ classroom performance reflect their innate intelligence, which can’t be changed by even the most effective teaching.b. Mandate tracking, with lower groups getting a slower-paced, basic-skills, test-prep curriculum.c. Assign the most effective teachers to high-achieving classes and rookies to the most challenged students.d. Curtail professional development in classroom management.e. Have teachers keep the criteria for getting good grades secret.f. Tell teachers it’s okay to prepare lessons the night before, in isolation from colleagues.g. Blame parents when students read below grade level and lack the “core knowledge” to understand the curriculum. h. Discourage schools from investing time in hands-on learning experiences, extracurricular activities, and field trips.i. Tell teachers to call only on students who raise their hands, build on correct responses, and maintain a brisk classroom pace.j. Forbid principals from making unannounced classroom visits, require them to base teacher evaluations on lengthy write-ups of a single lesson, and discourage them from critically evaluating all but the most egregiously incompetent teachers.k. Require that all classwork and tests be given final A, B, C, D, or F grades with little explanatory feedback.l. Require teachers to give demanding homework assignments that require the assistance of well-educated parents.m. Encourage the belief that what parents do with their children at home is none of the school’s business.n. Require teachers to follow a rigidly paced curriculum and forbid them from working beyond the contractual school day.o. Maximize the length of summer vacations.What’s the point of this depressing fantasy? The point is that many of these practices are all-too common in U.S. schools and each of them harms the learning of disadvantaged and low-achieving students. This is why, as Paul Tough wrote in a 2006 New York Times Magazine article, “The evidence is now overwhelming that if you take an average low-income child and put him into an average American public school, he will almost certainly come out poorly educated.” [See Marshall Memo 162 for a summary of this article.]Reading over the list, it’s also striking that half of these practices actually benefit advantaged and high-achieving students (for example, having the most effective teachers, a more rigorous curriculum, and greater opportunities for class participation) and the rest are neutral or considerably less harmful for advantaged than for disadvantaged students. “Thus,” says Marshall, “schools that use these practices drive the achievement of these two groups apart, widening the gap every day.” What would be the effect of doing the opposite of each of these 15 gap-widening practices? In a school that consistently implemented the flip-side, ask yourself if all students benefit equally – or would some gain more than others:a. Students are constantly told that students aren’t just born smart, they can get smart through effective effort.b. Students are grouped heterogeneously and instruction is differentiated while maintaining high expectations for all.c. Teachers with a demonstrated track record of being the most effective are assigned to the most challenging students and grade levels.d. Teachers are well trained in classroom management and schoolwide discipline is positive and strong.e. Learning expectations and the criteria for proficiency are made clear to students and parents.f. Teacher teams collaboratively map out curriculum units and agree on final assessments.g. Reading levels are accelerated using “just right” materials, and gaps in students’ core knowledge are systematically filled.h. Teaching caters to different learning styles, teachers maximize active student involvement, and all students are involved in enriching extracurricular activities.i. Teachers constantly check for understanding during classes and use the feedback to fine-tune instruction and reach all students.j. Principals make frequent unannounced classroom visits, give teachers prompt face-to-face feedback, refuse to tolerate mediocre or low-quality teaching, and work with teacher teams and instructional coaches to maximize adult and student learning.k. Students take interim assessments every 5-9 weeks and teacher teams analyze the data and help students with what they don’t understand.l. Teachers assign homework that students can do independently based on in-class learning and resources available to all.m. Parents are continuously informed of ways they can support their children’s learning at home and in school.n. Struggling students get prompt one-on-one or small-group help targeted to their needs.o. Academically needy students have expanded learning time during and after school hours, go to summer school, and have the materials and incentives needed to maximize learning outside of school.Marshall argues that each of these practices benefits disadvantaged and low-performing students the most. “Advantaged students would benefit too, but not as dramatically,” he says, “which would cause the achievement gap to gradually close.” The article includes a graph of student achievement in the Brazosport, Texas schools showing this kind of gap-closing impact from effective classroom and school practices.Implementing these 15 initiatives is a daunting challenge, concedes Marshall. Where should a school begin? He asks us to consider the “moment of truth” in a hypothetical classroom. A teacher finishes a well-taught curriculum unit, gives an assessment, records the grades, and tallies students on a 4-3-2-1 scale, where 3 is proficient and 1 is failure:4 - ••••3 - •••••••••2 - ••••••••1 - ••••Only 52% of students are proficient or above, but what usually happens next? Although we know what should happen, the reality is that few teachers feel they have the “luxury” to slow down and work with the 48% of students who didn’t fully master the material and those who outright failed. There’s pressure to cover the rest of the curriculum, and teachers may fear backlash from the parents of higher-achieving students and doubt their ability to change the bell-shaped curve.“These are powerful reasons,” says Marshall. “But let’s be blunt: Every time a teacher moves on with this many students below mastery, the achievement gap widens.” The students at levels 1 and 2 are probably those who entered with learning disadvantages (in fact, the teacher probably could have predicted their performance before instruction even began). “If the teacher moves on, these students will begin the next unit that much more confused, that much more discouraged, and that much more likely to think they’re stupid, adopt a negative attitude, and act out in class,” says Marshall. “And so it goes.” Clearly, teachers need to be empowered by the principal to stop when they see results like this, meet with grade-level colleagues, compare notes and figure out what went wrong, and reteach the material in a different way, while providing enrichment for already-proficient students. This is what highly effective districts like Brazosport have done. The key ingredients are:- Clarity around what students should learn;- On-the-spot assessments to catch as many learning glitches as possible during instruction;- Common interim assessments every 5-9 weeks;- Immediate analysis of the results by teacher teams and administrators;- Effective use of the insights gained to improve teaching and help struggling students.British researcher Dylan Wiliam sums it up well: “Agile teaching, responsive to student learning minute by minute, day by day, month by month.” Marshall closes by agreeing with Richard Rothstein’s argument (2004) that schools can’t close the achievement gap on their own. “America needs a full-court press,” says Marshall, “with the president, the federal government, state officials, mayors, university professors, doctors, dentists, business leaders, consultants, community groups, religious groups, and advocates working together to alleviate poverty, crime, unemployment, discrimination, health and housing problems, lead-paint poisoning, and other factors that result in some children starting school with such serious handicaps. But as we wait for this mobilization, schools can do a great deal right now. Schools can undertake all 15 of the interventions listed above without waiting for poverty and crime and racism to be erased. The most basic change – constantly checking to see if students are learning and following up when they aren’t – can be implemented in any school tomorrow. If we focus on that key classroom dynamic – the moment of truth where the gap either widens or narrows – we can make a huge difference in the outcomes we care about the most.”
“A How-To Plan for Widening the Gap” by Kim Marshall in Phi Delta Kappan, May 2009 (Vol. 90, #9, p. 650-655), http://www.marshallmemo.com/about.php