Achievement Gaps, Access, Quality And Florida's Vpk Program

An achievement gap between White students and students of color has been documented consistently at all education levels. Racial inequality in education is a serious problem in the United States. The Educational Longitudinal Study carried out in 2002 examined the relationship between race and composite reading and math scores among Black and White students. A total of 8,315 tenth grade students were included in this analysis. The results showed a difference in test scores between Black and White students with Whites scoring higher than Blacks (Rowely & Wright, 2011).The findings from this study suggest that discrimination based on race as well as family factors outside the school setting contribute to this difference

”...the birth of the brain is a blank tablet”(Locke). The brain knows the basics needs of life, it’s what you put in there that really counts. By age of five most of the adult brain is developed, so what’s the point of preschool? Morgan, a father of a preschool graduate, put it “Preschool is a daycare by another name”(LearnVest). People believe that kids need to develop on their own and they are right but the question is can they fully develop? Most kids need the extra push to guide them along the right path, and preschool gives that. Preschool can become expensive and as Morgan said …”daycare by another name.” So why bother doing it? Jean Piaget once said “...students build knowledge for themselves out of their experiences and how they use that knowledge to adapt to and organize their world”(Shane). So, if you give them the right knowledge they will go farther in life. A mom of three who only enrolled two of her children in preschool put it. “For us, preschool was mainly for socializing with other kids and to prepare them to work with a teacher other than myself”(LearnVest). Preschool is a great time for those socializing skills to come out and to be open-minded about working with new people. Preschool is a chance for them to learn at a young age how to work with other people. Preschool is a great way to get the correct facts in at a young age. Ultimately preschool should start at an early

Early childhood education is crucial for success in the formalized education system. Many children born into lower income communities do not obtain this advantage. According to Kozol, simply based off accident of birth a child will lead completely different educational lives (2005). For example, a white toddler in an upper middle class neighborhood might attend a prestigious educational preliminary kindergarten. These respected early education schools are often referred to as “baby ivies” (Kozol, 2005). The child participates in pre-numeracy skills along with pre-writing skills. Conversely, a child of minority descent living in an underprivileged neighborhood may not initiate school until they are five years old. In the three previous years a

Statement of Issue: Many minority children and children from low-income families enter kindergarten without the academic skills they need to succeed. Math and reading abilities at kindergarten entry are powerful predictors of later school success. Research shows kids who start school already behind are unlikely to ever get caught up to standards. Hispanic and African American children are anywhere from 7 to 12 months behind in reading and 9 to 10 months behind on math when they enter kindergarten. Access remains extremely low to high-quality early education do to a couple of problems. First, rates of access to early education vary widely as a function of children’s socioeconomic backgrounds. Secondly, the quality of most early education programs is not high enough to substantially improve academic readiness. Considering the tremendous potential for high-quality preschool to improve children’s outcomes, this policy brief will consider how a universal publicly funded pre-kindergarten program in the United States could decrease both disparities in access to early learning and achievement gaps at kindergarten entry.

“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.

The “achievement gap” is thought to exist between inner-city students and suburban students for many reasons, with one being the sheer amount of stress that underserved students face on a daily basis: factors such as poverty, absent or distracted parental input, actual physical dangers, and fear play huge parts in children’s ability to focus in a school environment. These kinds of chronic stressors can actually affect children’s ability to learn and cause damage to their brains.

There is a persistent achievement gap that has continually taken place within the educational system that needs to be secured. The National Center For Educational Statistics indicates, “gaps appear when one group of students out performs another group and there is a statistical difference in scores” (NEA, 2014). There is statistical evidence exhibiting gaps in performance between white students and their black and Hispanic counterparts in math and reading. Efforts to reach equivalence should start at home during early childhood and continue throughout the high school years (NCES, 2011).

Achievement Gaps in the United States are tough to define. Currently academia is focusing on racial and ethnic gaps and might be overlooking a subtle fact. There is a trend in ongoing research that shows many of lowest achieving students hail from a low socioeconomic status. Before addressing the racial gaps in achievement, educators must look towards better understanding the effect that low SES has on students. After knowing how much SES impacts achievement, educators and researchers will be better able to address racial achievement gaps without biased factors manipulating their data. Articles by Rolf K. Blank, a case study performed by the Washington Board of Education, and an article by Victoria Risko and Doris Walker-Dalhouse will explore

The evidence for positive economic, educational and health benefits from targeted preschool interventions is substantial (Barnett, 2010; Campbell, Conti, Heckman, Moon, Pinto, Pungello & Pan, 2014; Finn, 2010). However, the current research does not provide evidence that universal preschool will give the same long-term benefits as targeted preschool (Armor, 2014). This writer argues that universal preschool is not appropriate in the American context because the current government preschool programs have limited long term benefit, it subsidizes those who can afford to pay for private preschool and it takes money from targeted preschool for the neediest.

The achievement gap is difficult for children just entering school because the bar has already been set to where some of those children are going to land. At the age of three, children of people with careers have vocabularies that are nearly 1.5 times greater than those of working class children, and nearly double the children whose families are on welfare.” This statistic shows that even children at the age of three experience the achievement gap because of their own home life. It is imperative to reduce or eliminate the Achievement Gap in the U.S. To do this we must identify the problem, balance and control the funding, increase our teachers’ abilities and explain the benefits of closing the gap permanently.

Early childhood education has many benefits and there is the potential for many significant outcomes if universal preschools were put into place. Some feel that children who start kindergarten without previously attended preschool sometimes lack certain skills such as social and communication skills and an inability to follow routines. There were also studies done that found attending preschool could help to close the achievement gap in the grade school years. A child’s first few years of life are most important, and they absorb the most during those years. By providing universal preschool, all children would be benefiting, especially those who are in at-risk families or part of the lower class. As a society, we have a responsibility to help the children in our communities and provide them with the education they need in order to help them succeed in life.

Children living in the poor and students who are Hispanic or Black are statistically likely to be at risk for academic failure. They are more likely to face challenges associate with poverty, such as poor health, inadequate shelter, unhealthy environments, emotional stress, and limited access to reading materials. These risk factors might bring negative effects on a child’s cognitive development, and thus causes lower level of preferment in academic achievement. Take literacy as an example, According to Reading Is Fundamental (2014), the largest nonprofit children’s literacy organization in U.S, “61% of families living in poverty do not have age-appropriate books in their homes. Consequently, children living in poverty already have a 50 percent weaker vocabulary than their wealthier peers at the start of school.” And approximately 40% of 4th graders do not achieve basic levels of reading proficiency, and the percentage is even higher among family living in poverty and certain minority

These studies show that students in a higher-income community or family tend to score higher on standardized tests than students that do not come from a privileged background. Not only do the test scores differ drastically between an income gap, but between a racial gap as well. One study conducted on the Children of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth Child (CNLSY) showed a gap in test scores as early as kindergarten, between black and white children. The survey also concluded that “the gap shrinks only a little when black and white families have the same amount of schooling, the same income, and the same wealth” (Jencks and

Reading, writing and the ability to solve simple mathematical problems are a part of the necessary tools needed to survive in America. Consequently, such learning tools are used numerous times throughout the day without recognition. However, reading, writing and basic knowledge of mathematical problems are not equally achieved by all social groups. It is clear that education plays a major role in the future of an individual, yet there are achievement gaps between Black, White and Hispanic groups. Unfortunately, minority groups are not meeting the standard scoring according to statistics. White groups are exceeding Black and Hispanic groups in reading, writing, and mathematics. There are a vast number of reasons for

For decades, early childhood intervention programs, including child-care program facilities, have created controversial debates on the long-term effects that they have on a persons childhood and more importantly, their future development. Although there are various debates on early childhood intervention effects on future development, early intervention programs tend to show long-term effects on cognitive and academic achievement, and positive effects on occupational prestige and depressive symptoms. However, early childhood intervention programs do not show long-term effects on future behavioral development and social competence. In essence, it is these outcomes that provide insights as to why early intervention programs enhance or diminish the future development among children. In turn, the early child-care programs tend to have positive effects on a persons reading and mathematical skills at the high school level.