Does Income Affect a Child's Education?

Today I noticed a news item from the BBC News on Friday June 27 addressing the question about whether or not income determines a child's life. According to the latest research, Britain is seen as a divided society and a child's chances of success in life do depend on their parents' income. It made me stop and think about our own community here in New York, and the educational charities that I support, such as Children of the City and the Joe DiMaggio Award Committee for Xaverian High. Is the same true here in the U.S.?

In a recent, and first survey of attitudes to inequity sponsored by the Sutton Trust, three quarters of the adults questioned believed the gap between rich and poor in Britain is very large, and 69 percent said that the parents' income plays a big part in determining children's chances in life. But the other 31 percent thought levels of social mobility in the UK were "about right."

Director of Research for the educational charity, Dr. Lee Elliot Major said, "Opportunities in this country remain heavily determined by parental background. A wide range of research places Britain at or near the bottom of the league table of mobility, particularly in terms of the link between children's educational achievement and parental income."

Not unlike the problems in our own country, he continued, "If we are to promote real change, a first step is to recognise that we have a problem and create a consensus on the need for reform."

Our own charity here in Sunset Park, in Brooklyn New York recognized this almost 23 years ago. As you know I have been supporting Children of the City as a Board member, and also on my own website known as Rocco Basile.org.

The poll indicated that one in 10 people in Briton said they had moved from the bottom to the top income bracket in a generation. Seven out of 10 of the 2,000 people polled felt they were either downwardly mobile or static since childhood.

Apparently the prime minister there said that the UK government's vision is to create a Britain where everyone, no matter what their background, can make the most of their potential, and that deprivation and poverty in the long run can only be tackled by changing the aspirations of young people and their parents.

I believe this is actually quite true, based on some of the families that have had success at Children of the City. One example is the Santos family. Son David was just nine years old when a Children of the City outreach counselor visited his family. David made Children of the City his second home, and he began volunteering in the programs when he was a teenager.

David, pictured here with his own family is now 36, David provides tech support for the traders at Goldman Sachs. David credits Children of the City with helping him to learn the principles for success that helped him to rise above the effects of poverty that surrounded him in his youth.

-- Rocco Basile

New York's Reading Scores Rise Up

In an article that was published today in the New York Times, written by Jennifer Medina, we learn that reading and math scores for New York students in grades three through eight are showing sharp gains across the state of New York since last year. State reading and math test scores are up, which is fantastic news. The gains are in the five biggest cities in New York.

Across the sate of New York, 81 percent of students tested were at or above grade level in math, up from 73 percent last year, state education officials said. Reading scores, which has proved more difficult to improve, showed that about 69 percent of students met or exceeded state standards for their grade level, up from 63 percent last year. The passing rate is the percentage of students scoring in level 3 or 4.

New York state's education commissioner, Richard P. Mills believes these results are “encouraging and exciting.” He also said they were evidence that the state’s emphasis on giving more money to poorer school districts and focusing on high standards was successful.

This is really no surprise to me, because as you know I have been closely following educational trends and posting them in this blog and also on my website at http://www.roccobasile.com/ -- and we have seen tremendous results among the students at Children of the City who are in some of the the after school and summer programs where high priority is placed on each student’s academic success with intense tutoring and daily personal homework help. We have always seen dramatic increases in student’s reading and math levels, healthy study habits, communications, improved peer relationships, and more. Click here to learn more about this program.

As for the recent results in our state, for example, click here to see Brooklyn's results. These results have been climbing steadily over the last two years, and this year, about 57.6 percent of the students performed at or above grade level in reading, which is up from 50.7 percent in 2006, and 74.3 percent did so in math, up from 57 percent two years ago.

Still, four out of ten students in the city are still not reading at grade level, and although the students had improved substantially on New York’s exams, such gains were not mirrored in the national tests. Everyone agrees that the gap in achievement is between blacks and Latinos compared with whites had narrowed in the last several years.

The state education system is on its way to helping the overall situation, but programs like Children of the City will continue to bridge the gap and help those in need, by reaching out and providing solutions, where basic social services programs fail.

A Green'er Education for Kids

Now that summer is here, and kids are out of school, parents, school administrators and kids all need to think about our environment and keeping it a safe and beautiful place to enjoy summer after summer in the future.

According to a recent article in THE Journal by Chris Riedel entitled, "Green Schools : The Color of Money" school districts have finally discovered the abundant financial gains of going green.

"Something all schools are doing is consuming energy," says Arthur Stellar of the Massachusetts Taunton Public Schools. With energy costs on the rise, "we needed to find a way to better use our resources."

Energy efficiency isn't just about turning off lights and shutting down idle computers -- it is about rethinking the way things are done at every level of an organization. Schools need to take everything in to account, from natural gas and electricity use to HVAC (heating, ventilating, and air conditioning) systems, grounds maintenance, as well as construction procedures. Schools really need to develop long-term plans for maximizing savings. This is something most schools have no idea about. That's why the Taunton Public Schools contacted a group known as Energy Education, who is in the business of developing energy conservation programs for school districts around the U.S.

Energy Education's goal is to take dollars needlessly spent on energy and convert them to dollars spent on education. The group was retained to help Taunton find ways to decrease its energy consumption in order to increase its bottom line. "

Once example mentioned in the article, is that a typical school vending machine costs up to $450 a year to run, but by using a motion sensor that shuts down the machine's compressor when there is no activity, schools like those in the Taunton district can save up to two-thirds with each of the 40 to 50 vending machines. In fact, over the last two years, the Energy Education program alone helped Taunton save more than $660,000 in energy costs. That figure includes costs on electricity, natural gas, fuel oil, and water. Everything from disabling vending machine lights to managing irrigation has played a role in the savings.

Students everywhere in schools across the country are also beginning to get the message about taking responsibility on their own. Parents teachers, anyone who can help educate them, will make formidable changes in the future. It's why, in fact, that I have a website devoted to educational issues - http://www.roccobasile.com/. One of the most rewarding experiences is working with charities like Children of the City to try to make a difference.

Here's a list of environmentally inspired websites for kids to take a look at this summer:
Environmental Education for Kids - An online magazine for grades four to eight created by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, which has short articles and activities about animals, plants and environmental issues.
EPA Student Center - This Environmental Protection Agency site includes information on a wide range of environmental issues. Kids can click on "Fun Activities" to play environmental games.
The Green Squad - An NRDC website that's also available in Spanish shows you how to identify and solve environmental problems. You can can explore a colorful virtual school room by room, and use the mouse to locate potential hazards. Parents and teachers will find the site useful as it offers a wide range of resources on the environment.
The Greens - Izz and Dex are green animated characters that not only have green skin, but they have lots of great ideas about protecting the planet. Visit this site to watch short cartoons about environmental issues
Nature Challenge for Kids - This David Suzuki Foundation website place for all kinds of fun activities starting with ten simple ways you can protect nature, followed by four challenge activities that offer first-hand experience with the natural world.
Planet Slayer - "Greena, the Worrier Princess" is an animated Australian teenager who is going to save the earth. This website provides lots of fun facts and a greenhouse Q & A.
Tunza - This U.N. Environment Programme magazine is especially for young people and it focuses on a specific topic related to sustainable living. Read articles written by and for teens around the world.
Be, Live, Buy Different -- A project of the World Wildlife Fund and the Center for a New American Dream, the site was created to inform young people about how everything we buy and use affects biodiversity. Take the Buy-O-Diversity Quiz!

No Child left Behind Educational Growth Models

On June 10, U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings announced the approval of two high-quality growth models, which follow the bright-line principles of No Child Left Behind. It seems that once the states had developed the framework so they could measure student skills each year, as the law requires, all eligible states were then invited by Spellings to demonstrate progress over time and adapt a more sophisticated measurement system, also known as the growth model or value-added approach.

As I was reading the press release posted on the government's U.S. Department of Education website about the latest growth models on the No Child Left Behind program, and realized an interesting parallel to Children of the City. As you know I support them via my research website at http://www.toccobasile.org/, and via being on their Board. The reality is that it is all about accountability and results for individual students.

One example is Jonathan who before attending the Children of the City Create Success after school program only liked the subject of gym. Now he is up for the challenge of solving any math problem because with a little extra help from his Create Success tutor, he discovered that he loved to learn. “It’s fun here. We have discussions and they help me get all my homework done.”

When Jonathan's homework is finished you can find him searching the bookshelves in search of non-fiction, and he is also reading every book he can find about reptiles.

Spelling said that the states of Michigan and Missouri proposed program models that will support educational innovation while continuing to hold schools accountable for the goal of each student performing at or above grade level by 2014.

The Department will gather data to measure student improvement while holding the schools accountable for results. Following are the bright-line principles for these high-quality growth models:

Ensure that all students are proficient by 2014 and set annual state goals to ensure that the achievement gap is closing for all groups of students;
- Set expectations for annual achievement based upon meeting grade-level proficiency and not upon student background or school characteristics;
- Hold schools accountable for student achievement in reading/language arts and mathematics;
- Ensure that all students in tested grades are included in the assessment and accountability system, hold schools and districts accountable for the performance of each student subgroup and include all schools and districts;
- Include assessments, in each of grades 3 through 8 and high school, in both reading/language arts and mathematics that have been operational for more than one year and have received approval through the NCLB standards and assessment review process for the 2005-06 school year. The assessment system must also produce comparable results from grade to grade and year to year;
- Track student progress as part of the state data system; and
Include student participation rates and student achievement as separate academic indicators in the state accountability system.

The peer reviewers, who represent academia, private organizations and state and local education agencies, reviewed each state's proposal based on the Peer Review Guidance (http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/guid/growthmodelguidance.doc) issued by the U.S. Department of Education.