The Achievement Gap That Exists Between Inner-City Students

In article How Kids Learn Resilience, Paul Tough argues that stress can push a child into a cycle of failure in school, harmfully impacting a child’s education and outside life. He claims that stress is apparent in every student’s life; however some have more and this stress has a direct connection on the child’s success both in school and out. Stress can be caused by many things, such as economic, family, or even social problems. The stress prevents a student from staying focused in school because they are distracted by other problems. Since they are not able to focus, they do not perform well at school, leading to bad grades, which leads to more stress. This cycle continues and the student is unable to learn as the workload gets more complicated.

For decades now, there have been educational problems in the inner city schools in the United States. The schools inability to teach some students relates to the poor conditions in the public schools. Some of the conditions are the lack of funds that give students with the proper supplies, inexperienced teachers, inadequate resources, low testing scores and the crime-infested neighborhoods. These conditions have been an issue for centuries, but there is nothing being done about it. Yet, state and local governments focus on other priorities, including schools with better academics. It is fair to say that some schools need more attention than other does. However, when schools have no academic problems then the attention should be focused

The “achievement gap” in education refers to the disparity in academic performance between groups of students. The achievement gap is shown in grades, standardized-test scores, course selection, dropout rates, among other success measures. It’s most often used to describe the troubling performance gaps between African-American and latino students, towards the lower end of the performance scale, compared to their white peers, and the similar academic differences between students from low-income families and those who are privileged. In the past decade, scholars and policy makers began focusing their attention on other achievement gaps, such as those based on sex, English language and learning disabilities.

How should society handle the perceived differences between races when it comes to education? The goal of both researchers is to narrow the academic gap between white and black students. Both authors attribute the gap between the academic scores of black and white students from opposite sides of racial identity. As Dr. Beverly Daniels Tatum, President of Spelman College and clinical psychologist has written an article entitled “Why are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?” Her approach is from the perspective of the student and how they perceive their role and upper limits while maintaining their place in their peer group's expectations of their race. Dr. Diane Ravitch, a research professor of education at New York University, has written an article entitled "The Facts about the Achievement Gap.” Her approach is from the perspective of how schools and society implicitly or explicitly cast students into achievement tracks based on their race. Both approach the same idea about racial identity, but they have different solutions, such as peer groups, the school board, and who is right about the solution.

In my last paper, I discussed the achievement gaps within the low-income African American community at Steele School in Galesburg, IL. Now that I have looked into the history of low-income African American students, I am now going to research even more by exploring trends, issues, evidence-based remediation practices, the preferred learning styles and the identified achievement gap of low-income African American students. Through the chart I am going to display, this will show various ways that low-income African American students are struggling at Steele School. However, I am hoping with the information below I can use this to display to others how certain multicultural education, learning styles, and culturally responsive teaching can enhance learning environments for all underachieving students.

Are Black Americans Dumber than White Americans? Can it unequivocally be stated that European Americans hold more intelligence then African Americans? Are African Americans genetically wired to have a lesser mental capacity then European Americans? For a long time this was the explanation to a burning problem. African Americans score lower than White Americans on vocabulary, reading, and mathematics tests, as well as on tests that claim to measure scholastic aptitude and intelligence. “This gap appears before children enter kindergarten and it persists into adulthood. The typical American black still scores below 75 percent of American whites on most standardized

Their body’s alarm system is switched way on, so they may be primed for fight or flight and not able to sit calmly” (Bloom). For these kids, meditation becomes an outlet to relieve their pent-up emotions, and let their guards down for several moments. The room becomes a safe haven for them, which is why meditation should be more common in classrooms across the world, for students of all ages.

Ever since the establishment of equal education in the United States, there has been a disparity in academic success between children of different races. The education of African American children has become a prime example of this. As discussed in the historical text, A Letter to My Nephew, which was written during the time of the civil rights movement in the 1950’s and 1960’s, African Americans were not given equal opportunities to succeed educationally and could do little to change their futures for the better. They had to work much harder than whites to receive even a portion of the recognition and success that whites achieved (Baldwin 1). Although many today believe America has overcome this problem, it still remains a pressing issue in many aspects of society, arguably the most important being education. The racial achievement gap, an important term to familiarize with when discussing this topic, refers to the disparity in educational performance between students of different races (National Education Association 1). As of now, although the education achievement gap has been narrowing, there still remains a large disparity between African Americans and their racial counterparts. According to a study by Roland G. Freyer and Steven D. Levitt, professors at Harvard University and W.E.B Du Bois Institute, respectively, African American students enter kindergarten already significantly behind children of other races, and their test scores continue to drop

Mindfulness should be taught in schools because it has been found to have a positive impact on the students ' mental well-being as mentioned above, as well as having positive impacts on a wide range of physical and mental health conditions, on learning and cognition, and on emotional and social skills and wellbeing among adults, according to Katherin (2012). Very little research has been done about mindfulness among the young people as compared to among the adults, with studies carried out so far having some methodological limitations such as limited use of control groups or randomization and small numbers, which result in tentative conclusions. Nevertheless, work is growing rapidly and the results are promising which suggests that mindfulness in schools is well worth doing.

The pressures of racism on today’s society are being perpetuated by socioeconomic shaming against less fortunate black schoolchildren to look to the future of becoming less successful than the more financially stable white schoolchild sitting in the next classroom. The most unfortunate part about the white-black achievement gap is that there is no easy solution to solving it. One large proponent of the achievement gap between all schoolchildren is the factor of wealth and affluence in their homes. The racial achievement gap compared to the wealth achievement gap is quite staggering. Diane Ravitch states that “in contrast to the racial achievement gap, which has narrowed, the income achievement gap is growing…[and is] nearly twice as large

“The socioeconomic achievement gap in education refers to the inequality in academic achievement between groups of students. The achievement gap shows up in grades, standardized test scores, course selection, dropout rates, and college-completion rates, among other success measures” (Ansell, 2017). Typically, when discussing the achievement gap, educators are comparing the academic progress of African-American students or Hispanic students to the progress of white students. More-often-than-not the white students will have more educational achievements than their non-white colleagues (Ansell, 2017). The most widely accepted theory as to why students with higher socioeconomic status (SES) do better academically is high parental involvement, access to economic resources and access to highly qualified teachers (Huang, 2015. Pg.6). Students of low socioeconomic status often live in poverty. This means that the student may not have sufficient school supplies or even someone at home to help him with his homework. There are numerous children in the United States’ school systems that are failing due to the achievement gap. These students are at a disadvantage because the school systems and teachers do not notice or even care about their home life and how it comes into play in their education. It is important for our nation to not only understand the achievement gap but take steps toward correcting it.

As minority students increased in urban public schools, they have now become the majority of the school population and have brought difficult topics to the surface; race and ethnicity. In Another Inconvenient Truth: Race and Ethnicity Matter, Hawley and Nieto published their beliefs on how cultural differences are not to be tucked away and hidden in an educational setting, but embraced and celebrated to promote education by the teacher in an academic journal: Educational Leadership. Their appeals and claims provide various instruction to guide professional educators to overcome the achievement gap.

The first public school in the United States opened in Boston in the year of 1821. By the end of the 19th century, public secondary schools began to outnumber private ones. Nevertheless, the education system started with many flaws. One of the biggest problems of the public educational system is that, although it gave the less advantaged an opportunity to learn, it did so in a segregated way. When we talk about the segregation of the past, everyone seems to agree that it was a real problem. However, when someone say the schools are still segregated today, many people (from advantaged social groups) would disagree. One thing to keep in mind is that, desegregation is not limited to having multiracial schools with students of color sitting next to white students. Desegregation goes beyond the school scope and family and community cultures also play an important role. To make things worse, the education system is having several problems on achieving its mission of preparing the youth to succeed personally and professionally. According to experts, the achievement gap shows how big those problems are. In order to understand why the achievement gap is related to today 's segregation, we need to understand what achievement gap is. The best definition of achievement gap, describes it as the difference in educational proficiency between students who come from high or middle class white families,

When the conversation about achievement gap is broached, it is often offensive towards minorities. Mainly because it implies that you’re acknowledging the fact that there is and achievement difference among their race and Whites. Personally I have no problem with the term because it is factual. It’s what school officials are not doing to close this gap that i have a problem with The achievement gap is sustained by poor school management and teaching—not other social or cultural factors. In order to close this gap among students, school officials must better prepare teachers, implement a common core curriculum, and encourage positive teacher-student relationships.

The environment a child in poverty lives in is a huge factor in that may affect their academic success. Children from low income families tend to live in low-income neighborhoods that are often associated with high crime rates, high concentration, and few opportunities for academic socialization (Engle, Patrice, and Black 5). These neighborhoods have health risks,