Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion The Rich-Poor Divide Starts With Kindergarten

Occupy Kindergarten: The Rich-Poor Divide Starts With Education

http://www.theatlantic.com/business...oor-divide-starts-with-education/252914/


Very interesting little article. What is your take on this growing divide? Given the experiences I've seen on these boards, I think the sad truth is, that it often requires a lot of time and money to get a proper education for your children, especially if your child is gifted.

You could also take the tack that people with a higher IQ are more likely to become affluent, and marry other people with a high IQ and then produce children with a high IQ. And folks with a low IQ are likely to go in the opposite direction.

Yes, I've written a few posts along these lines. An implication relevant to this forum is that giftedness is not evenly distributed across income groups.

I suspect that there may be a correlation-without-causation issue here. I agree that smarter people are more likely to earn more and less likely to be poor. Some smart people are poor, but it's more likely that they won't be.

More women work now than did in the 1960s, and they have more career options. A two-earner family with two intelligent and educated earners will tend to earn a lot more than a two-earner family with only basic skills. The fact that more mothers work today could be one reason behind affluence of families with brighter parents today compared to 1962.

But the sad truth is that someone with an average IQ isn't super bright and that half the population is below that number. It's just a fact that some kids will not do super-well in an academic kindergarten environment. IMO, the kids aren't necessarily "failing." In at least some cases, the schools are failing to accept that some kids just need to go more slowly. But of course, respecting their abiliteis isn't allowed in a culture where everyone should go to college.

There will always be an achievement gap in life. It can't be closed. Some people are more talented than others. Some are luckier. Some have better connections. Etc. etc. The same is true in school. Some kids are just smarter. There's an achievement gap in sports, but no one seems to talk about closing it (presumably because most everyone admits that some kids just have more athletic talent).

I would prefer to put energy into being honest about people's abilities and helping them find jobs that fit with their talents, rather than pretending that we can just wish away differences in cognitive ability.

Do you think it may be more of a case of there being more opportunities for higher ability children than there were, meaning that those with the means are more able to have their kids identified and educated appropriately than was possible in 1962? This would mean that there are more of the higher achievers now than there were, but that they are still the richest kids out there? It seems that there is probably more pressure on wealthier families to have 'gifted' children so that they can keep up with the Joneses at the club.

Personally I find it very frustrating that I can't get the appropriate public education for my child, we are probably considered to be middle class and as with healthcare, it's up to us to either find money we don't have or have our kids go without. I realize that there are a lot of folks out there with considerably less than us, and I feel guilty sometimes complaining, because we do at least have an adequate public school. My kids will not be trying to choose between bullets and babies. But why does OK have to be enough?

The rich poor divide starts before kindergarten--the evidence is clear imo that quality pre-school makes a difference.

Let's be a little cautious about the correlation between socio-economic status and innate smarts. There are powerful situational factors that can supress innate talent, and that persist from generation to generation.

Growing up poor, with no books in the home, parents who are gone all the time because they work two jobs each, belonging to a racial minority that is expected by teachers to underperform, and maybe even having been exposed to drugs in utero, not to mention the damaging effects of chronic stress on the brain, can all result in an adult who's brain isn't wired to perform as well as it could have under different developmental conditions. And guess what's going to happen to that person's children?

Yes, there is surely some effect of smarts on upward and downward mobility, but overall, mobility between SES levels is really pretty limited. (Equally true at the other end, by the way. Spectacularly stupid people who are born into upper class families don't tend to be downwardly mobile.)

Charles Murray, in a recent article

Five myths about white people
Washington Post
February 10, 2012
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...-people/2012/01/20/gIQAmlu53Q_story.html

explains that little of the class difference in academic achievement is due to differences in school quality and lists as a myth that

"Elite colleges are bastions of white upper-middle-class privilege"

It’s common to assume that upper-middle-class white kids win more slots in top universities than middle-class or working-class students not because they’re smarter, but because their parents can afford to send them to the best grade schools and high schools, pay for SAT prep courses, or make hefty donations to colleges.

There are two problems with this logic. First, ever since the landmark Coleman Report on educational equality back in 1966, scholars have had a hard time demonstrating that attending fancy elementary and secondary schools raises students’ academic performance. And on average, those highly touted test-preparation courses boost students’ SAT scores by only a few dozen points — a finding consistent across rigorous studies of test-prep programs.

Second, educational attainment is correlated with intelligence. (The mean IQ of white Americans with just a high school diploma is about 99; the mean IQ of whites with a professional degree is about 125.) And children’s IQ is tied to that of their parents. How genes and environment conspire to produce these relationships is irrelevant; the relationships have been stable for decades. As a result, white parents with advanced educations — who are also generally affluent — inevitably account for a disproportionate number of the white kids with the highest SAT scores, best grades and other evidence of academic excellence.

If college admission were purely meritocratic — eliminating favoritism for the children of alumni, celebrities and big donors — upper-middle-class children would still be overrepresented. That’s because the applicants who would be accepted instead would also hail overwhelmingly from the upper middle class.



What is true about elite college admissions is also true of gifted program admissions.

True, but the "achievement gap" refers to group, not individual differences. Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achievement_gap_in_the_United_States says the "[a]chievement gap refers to the observed disparity on a number of educational measures between the performance of groups of students, especially groups defined by gender, race/ethnicity, and socioeconomic status."

I think great deal also has to do with advocacy. The middle class and above mother as the knowledge, time, and resources to advocate for her child.

As a teacher who teaches in a low-income school, there are many factors at play. Many of the parents speak no English. Their main concern is to get food on the table. They think that the school is naturally doing what's best for their child. However, this is not always true. A child in this situation could have high potential but due to circumstances (limited sleep, limited exposure, ESL, food shortage, etc.) will score lower on assessment tests the district uses making it seem like he/she is below the gifted cutoff.

The curriculum and opportunities play a part as well. Higher income school districts have more staff, lower class sizes, more advanced courses, and gifted programs. While I am aware the quality of each is often lacking, I think we can agree that simply having a gifted program acknowledges a step in the right direction. Lower-income schools have no gifted program or limited advanced coursework. Textbook and Testing companies are also ravaging these schools. If they school low on assessments, curriculum is swapped for heavily scripted lessons. One district moved to a "Reading First" curriculum that had curriculum representatives force teachers to remove all their trade books and only use the supplied reading basal, because we all know that to increase reading we limit student reading interactions?! This creates a cycle where they score well enough on the matching assessment, but still do poorly enough to warrant the continued use of the company.

Long story short, I think advocacy plays a huge factor. For the most part, middle-class and above families know how to fight for their child's education.

Oh, I'm aware it's very, very un-PC to suggest it. But if you look at all the studies out there is becomes apparent that while there are folks who are "left behind" due to circumstance, by and large you cannot for account this gap. It's not due to early access to pre-school, it's not due to race, it's not due to time spent reading with small children, or other 'early literacy' activities. All of those things have been show to have very limited impact on a child's education.

IMO, we need to get away from all this political correctness. Political correctness is how we ended up with this silly idea that "every child is gifted in his/her own special way" and that every child can/should attend college! It's just ignoring basic human ability.

ETA: I disagree with your comment that "Spectacularly stupid people who are born into upper class families don't tend to be downwardly mobile." Of course they do. It's apparent when those idiot people have children. And when those kids have children. There are countless instances of stupid people squandering their inheritance and leaving their families broke.