Ability Tracking Essay

I teach first grade at Lowe Elementary School; my class is made up of twenty-four very diverse seven year-olds; they come from all over the city of Louisville, from a variety of socio-economic situations. Each student brings a unique personality to our classroom community, and they all work hard to become “smarter and smarter” and to “go to college”. Thirteen students are boys and eleven are girls. Of these twenty-four students, three of them are English Language Learners. Additionally, eight students receive tier two interventions and two receive tier three interventions in reading. In math, five students are tier two and four are tier three. I also teach one student who receives ECE services for a developmental delay. Within my class there is a wide achievement gap.

The data is compared to those students come from affluent socioeconomic status and backgrounds. The data is sourced from several diverse locations in order to give the broadest view of the disparities that exist. Howard (2010) compares data in reading, mathematics, SAT results and disciplinary rates. This data is a formidable beginning to the content of the book because it provides context for the reader to better understand the achievement gap.

The United States of America has a long and complicated history of segregation and inequality. Though the country has fought fiercely to redeem itself by eradicating the practice of inequality in many areas, there are still some concerns that remain. These concerns are present in the public education system, and relate to the time-honored practice of educators to group and educate students by their ability level. This paper will discuss how students historically have been classified based on ability tracking and grouping, the legal issues created by this classification, and what the Constitution requires in order to maintain equal protection rights for all citizens.

Whether or not society admits it, students are already separated in schools. In Professor Ronald Corwin’s article, “The Case for Specialized Schools,” he says that students are already separated in school systems. Minorities that live on opposite sides of the city are separated because of their social classes as well as being grouped by labels inside of schools including: “underachiever,” “at risk,” “gifted and talented,” “slow learner,” and “vocational” (Corwin). Corwin would think that these schools are already unequal and separated unfairly in certain ways, so he reasons that the school system should make this separation “official.” This way, certain populations will be better served. Students with special

Following the passing of the No Child Left Behind Act in 2002, US students have slipped from being ranked 18th in math in 2000 to 27th in 2012, with a similar decline in science and no change in reading. Standardized tests are unfair and discriminatory against non-English speakers and students with special needs [E. (2011, January 01)]. A 2007 national study conducted by the Center for Education policy revealed that since 2001, 44% of school districts had reduced the time spent on science, social studies and the arts by an estimate of 145 minutes per week in order to focus on reading and math while neglecting the other areas of study.

The American education system is failing the generations of the future. Society neglects the children born into impoverished areas, while mainly white upper class children participate in superior educational activities. Low-income neighborhoods often produce schools with low scoring students. Therefore the government transitions these schools into impersonal factories. The phrase diversity masquerades the reality of re-segregation of schools. Many schools across the country are utilizing the phrase diversity, yet the statistics reveal that over ninety percent of the students are black or Hispanic. Creating successful environments is extremely difficult and subsequently results in serious consequences for the American education system.

Two articles, The Facts about the Achievement Gap by Diane Ravitch and From Still Separate, Still Unequal: America’s Educational Apartheid by Jonathan Kozol, provide facts about the crumbling education system in the inner cities of America. Schools there have shown to be segregated, poorly staffed, and underfunded. While the theme of both articles may be educational shortcomings, the content is surrounded by discussions of segregation. There are more underlying factors the authors are missing. Readers need to be rallied together in a unilateral cause to identify the issues affecting the nation’s education system, segregation is not one of them.

In American education, there is overwhelming evidence that there is an achievement gap between groups of students. In other words, there are measurable differences in the educations and test scores of different groups of students. Some gaps exist between groups or differing gender or socioeconomic status, but the largest gaps exist between groups of different races. America has always been a country with an influx of different cultures through immigration. In schools, these cultures still remain separated. The most noticeable separation is probably that of White and African American students. Although the achievement gap between White and Black students is easily seen there are other clear gaps in the education of Latino and Asian American

“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.

“Multiplication is for White People”, by Lisa Delpit, presented the facts about what was missing in American education. The missing pieces added fuel to the already burning achievement gap fire. Throughout the text, I connected personally with several of the opinions and information provided. According to Delpit (2012), “educational policy [had] been virtually hijacked by the wealthiest citizen, whom no one elected and who [were] unlikely ever to have had a child in the public schools” (p. xv).I recalled many conversations with my colleagues pertaining to this very idea. How could someone, who had no idea what it was like to be in a classroom, dictate what I did in that classroom? Unfortunately, it seemed that the wealthy citizens in society

Another reality that Diane Ravitch sheds light on is the misconstrued theories about the achievement gap. Reformers often say that African American and Hispanic students have not made progress for decades (Ravitch, p.55). However, after looking at the data from NAEP, it is evident that this assertion by the reformers just simply is not true. Rather, these students have shown dramatic increases in math. Many do not recognize this though because white achievement has also improved which keeps the gap at large. (Ravitch, p.56) Throughout different grades, African Americans and Hispanics have shown remarkable progress in mathematics. There has been improvement in reading as well, just not as dramatic as the progress shown in math. Ravitch states, “Today’s reformers often imply that schools alone can close the achievement gaps among different groups. The like to point to exemplary charter schools with high test scores to prove their point” (Ravitch, p.59). While the belief that a charter school could bridge the achievement gap and overcome the disadvantages of poverty, it simply is not a realistically feasible concept. Thomas B. Timar of the University of California states, “Yet the gap is the symptom of larger social, economic and political problems that go far beyond the reach of the school… While schools are part of the solution, they alone cannot solve the problem of educational disparities” (Ravitch, p.60). Timar calls society to take action by

Tracking is the grouping of students by perceived academic abilities for instruction. As a pedagogical strategy, tracking was initially introduced into U.S. public schools in the early 1900’s as a way to educate and socialize the broadly changing population of urban, northern cities that swelled from European immigration and poor southern black transplants seeking better opportunities. Societal beliefs of the time regarding distinct division of classes and the requisite assimilation of immigrants into American culture resulted in new educational laws that popularized a system that segregated classrooms into “slow, bright and deficient” (Ansalone, 2010, p. 4) levels of learners. Tracking was viewed and used as a practical strategy in

The reason that most people High School don’t have good study skills is because they were not taught proper study habits in Elementary School, where this should be taught.

Both activities have shown me that the definition of a complex problem is in itself complex (Funke, 1991) and is subject to many interpretations by different researchers (Gray, 2002 and Wenke et al, 2005). It has also shown me that presenting a problem in a different manner can affect how the solutions are thought about (Gambrill, 2006).

How widespread is ability grouping? No reliable national surveys of ability grouping in elementary schools have been conducted, but a consistent picture emerges from several local studies. According to the article “Ability-Group Effects: Instructional, Social, or Institutional?,” (Pallas, 1994) ability grouping for reading instruction appears nearly universal, especially in the early grades. Schools seek to create teachable groups of children within classes containing a broad range of skills, from students who independently breeze through children's novels to those who have yet to learn basic letter sounds. Ability grouping in math is less frequent and only in the upper grades, but remains rare at the elementary