Slowly but surely

In a previous post, I had included this excerpt from Ellwood Cubberley's Public Education in the United States, regarding the difficulty of implementing mandatory schooling:

The history of compulsory-attendance legislation in the states has been much the same everywhere, and everywhere laws have been enacted only after overcoming strenuous opposition.

. . .

At first the laws were optional...later the law was made state-wide but the compulsory period was short (ten to twelve weeks) and the age limits low, nine to twelve years. After this, struggle came to extend the time, often little by little...to extend the age limits downward to eight and seven and upwards to fourteen, fifteen or sixteen; to make the law apply to children attending private and parochial schools, and to require cooperation from such schools for the proper handling of cases; to institute state supervision of local enforcement....

Keeping this in mind, I find it somewhat alarming that most states now provide public preschool, even if it's optional. In Alaska there is an effort underway to provide such preschool, which educators say will help disadvantaged students:

What has people really excited is the idea that such a program would help out students who struggle the most. Minorities and children from low-income homes average poorer scores on tests than white and middle-class students. This long-standing gap above all else shapes education policies and trends today, from the federal No Child Left Behind Act on down.

Many teachers and principals say a quality early childhood program could get disadvantaged kids on track before they start elementary school and help shrink this achievement gap....

"So many young people come to kindergarten or first grade and are so far back that even with the most effective teachers, we can't help them along far enough," Sampson said....

First of all, to suggest that a child who is 5 is so far behind that they'll never catch up strikes me as absurd. Only someone who believes in the age-segregated, rigidly timed, assembly-line school as the only means of education could believe that a 5-year-old child presents a hopeless case.

I'm really tired of the achievement gap being used to promote even more mass schooling. The fact is that schools have not succeeded in closing this gap. When you are digging yourself into a hole, the first rule is to stop digging, not to dig faster and with a bigger shovel.

Educators seem to feel that the achievement gap is not the fault of the schools:

[American Federation of Teachers President Sandra] Feldman says the charge that schools are failing to educate poor children "is a total myth." As to why the achievement gap persists, she says, "One of the main answers can be found in the 68 percent of a child's waking hours outside of school versus the 32 percent spent in school." To drive the point home, Feldman also proposes extended-day and extended-year schooling along with new summer programs.

The NEA, the PTA, and various organizations point to abundant research that parental involvement in the schools is crucial to students' success. They use this to suggest that failures are the fault of parents. Well, they can't have it both ways. They can't blame the parents for failures but take the credit for successes: if there's an achievement gap, it's the parents' fault; if there is not an achievement gap it's because of extended schooling, including public preschool. They can't ask to have our children from age 3 to age 16 and then blame us if they fail to come through with their egalitarian promises.

Another program that I found alarming was San Diego's "6 to 6" program, which, if you read the overview, seems to have been motivated largely by a desire to keep kids locked away for the safety of the community:

San Diego's "6 to 6" Program was the third phase of the Mayor's Safe Schools Initiative. Other elements include a daytime anti-loitering law aimed at preventing minors from congregating off campus during school hours and a new teen curfew. In 1995, the Mayor's Safe Schools Task Force was formed consisting of the Mayor, City Manager, City Attorney, Chief of Police, superintendent of San Diego Unified School District, school principals, a County of San Diego juvenile court judge, County juvenile probation officers, and other interested parties. The task force developed three goals for the safety of students:

• To close school campuses during lunch time.
• To enforce curfew and truancy laws.
• To open schools before and after school to provide San Diego's "6 to 6" Program during hours that most parents work.

Each of these three goals has been implemented for the safety of children and families in our communities.

I like how overt they are about bringing in law enforcement authorities in designing a better warehousing program. Real nice.

In Arizona, 45 schools operate year-round. In one such school district, students go for 9 weeks and then have 2 weeks off, with a slightly longer break during summer. I thought this was an interesting paragraph:

Studies show test scores are about the same between year-round and regular schools, Christensen said, but he likes the extra help Longfellow can give students who are a little behind.

If you increase any test scores, say by giving extra help to students who are slightly behind as suggested, you necessarily increase the average score-- unless you have another set of students whose scores deteriorate at the same rate. In any case the key part of the above quote is that regular and year-round schools have the same test scores, so I am not sure why Arizona's state school superintendent says summer break is too long. People accept this lament, that kids forget everything over the summer, but the evidence in the article contradicts that notion.

What's worse, some students in this example school district have to attend remedial programs during their two weeks breaks or in summer. And any student may attend these programs. Thus 180 days becomes more than 180 days for many-- yet still test scores don't improve.

To sum up, educators want to start schooling earlier, extend the school day, and extend the school year, for reasons including closing the achievement gap, for the "safety" of students, or to remedy an imagined barrier to better education (summer break). The evidence or reasoning supporting these arguments is dubious to nonexistent, but hey, it's mostly optional, right?

Well, just remember Ellwood Cubberley:

At first the laws were optional... later the law was made state-wide but the compulsory period was short.... After this, struggle came to extend the time....