The Achievement Gap

Currently, only 70 percent of all students in public high schools graduate and this number drops to just 53 percent of students from low income families. By the end of fourth grade, low income students, by various measures, are already two years behind other students. By the time these students reach 8th grade, they are three grade levels behind in reading and math. If they reach 12th grade, low-income and minority student achievement levels are about four years behind those of other young people. Low graduation rates are evidence that, in the earlier grades, schools are not meeting the fundamental achievement needs of low-income students.

The bottom line should be alarming for all Americans. A very high proportion of our students are leaving public schools unprepared to gain access to our country’s economic, social and political opportunities. As we strive to become a nation in which no child is left behind, all U.S. public school students deserve the opportunity to graduate from high school and college.

Why are we concerned about public education?

The American workforce is changing. At the close of the last century, African-American and Hispanic children made up 34 percent of the school age population. In a decade, only 15 percent of the new entrants to the labor force will be native white males, compared with 47 percent today.

The fundamental nature of the economy has changed. As a consequence of global competition and advances in technology, many of the good blue-collar jobs the economy generated for most of the last century have largely disappeared. Almost all the jobs that pay enough to support a family now require higher levels of literacy, language fluency, and technical training than in the past. To a greater extent than ever before, educational attainment will determine one’s quality of life. Recent U.S. Census data indicate that there is an increasing salary gap between college and high school graduates. In 1980, college graduates earned 50 percent more than high school graduates and by 2000, that percentage increased to 111 percent.