The widespread incident of neighborhood violence and drug usage in America’s inner cities has had and continues to have a devastating impact on her urban schools. There’s no denying it. The district in which I work is the nation’s 18th largest district. Our city has the state’s highest crime rate and the neighborhood in our city with the highest crime rate includes a middle school in which I was recently stationed for 6 intensive weeks as part of LEA Improvement (since our entire district of 180 schools is currently in Corrective Action, as per NCLB legislation). That is all to say, I get to see the impact of neighborhood crime, violence, and drug use first hand.
But these are all corollary to a more fundamental problem: poverty. The number of children in the US living in poverty – both urban and rural poverty - is staggering. The graph below depicts America’s children living in as compare to the poverty rate of other countries.
How can the most economically advantaged country in the world permit so many economically disadvantaged children?
I first saw this graph as I prepared a workshop for teachers on Urban Education. The more I researched this topic, and learned about the incident of students living in poverty, the more I became outraged. How could this state of affairs have happened in our America?
I don’t have a solution – there is no quick and easy solution. But as a citizen and especially as an educator who is routinely entrenched in the mess it has caused, I am outraged and think every citizen should be likewise.
The impact of poverty trumps the impact of drugs, crime, and violence. Indeed, the latter follow quite predictably from the former. dven.
“How can the most economically advantaged country in the world permit so many economically disadvantaged children?”
So the country is responsible for the the poverty? Like it is there fault for allowing it? How about you state it this way: How can parents who live in the most economically advantaged country in the world permit so many economically disadvantaged children?
I’ve done community work in the inner-city for 6 years now. And what I know is that it’s not the fault of the country so much as the parents. I go into these families houses and they live in filth but have a better T.V. then I do. They know better but most don’t care enough to do something better. The least they could do is make sure their kids go to school and do their homework so they can end the cycle. But most parents don’t care and so the children.
Even though you use the wrong ‘there’ in your 2nd sentence (I know, it’s not a sentence), you raise an interesting point. Parents own some culpability, to be sure, but poverty often begets poverty, and the culture of poverty produces a mentality that impacts kids’ education. You’re right: parents have more to do with school success than any other factor. The research is clear on this. How can we educate parents whose kids live in poverty to help those kids have an opportunity to transcend poverty?
Wow that’s an interesting statistic. If I’m reading this right, then about 1 in 5 children are living below the poverty line, which according to wikipedia is $21,834 for a family of four. I think volunteer tutors and mentors can help tremendously. I agree that a lot of the responsibility also falls on the parent to encourage their children to study and work hard for a better life. College also needs to be made more affordable.
nice post Dven. Thanks for the info.