[Vision2020] Reading, Math and Grit

Sat Sep 8 15:52:59 PDT 2012

I really appreciate Wayne posting this information.  Too often poverty
and/or dysfunctional families make learning especially challenging for kids.
We need increased funding for programs like these to provide the support for
all kids.   I can't wait to read the book.

Rose Huskey

From: vision2020-bounces at moscow.com [mailto:vision2020-bounces at moscow.com]
On Behalf Of Art Deco
Sent: Saturday, September 08, 2012 2:43 PM
To: vision2020 at moscow.com
Subject: [Vision2020] Reading, Math and Grit

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  _____  

September 7, 2012

Reading, Math and Grit

By JOE NOCERA

Early in his acceptance speech
<http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/president-obama-dnc-speech-full-tr
anscript-article-1.1153851>  Thursday night, President Obama gave a nod to
his administration's backing of education reform. "Some of the worst schools
in the country have made real gains in math and reading," he said, calling
on the country to add 100,000 math and science teachers in the next decade.
Then he moved on to other topics, like foreign policy and Medicare
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics
/medicare/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier> , that he clearly views as more
vital to the campaign as it enters the home stretch. 

It is hardly a surprise that education isn't a heated subject in the
presidential race. Not when the economy is still sluggish, and the fight
over the role of government so central. Besides, Republicans and Democrats
alike have tried to fix education: George W. Bush with "No Child Left Behind
<http://www.edweek.org/ew/issues/no-child-left-behind/> ," and Obama with
his administration's "Race to the Top
<http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/fact-sheet-race-top> ." Those
"real gains" notwithstanding, progress remains fitful and frustrating. Too
many disadvantaged children remain poorly educated. Too many high school
graduates don't attend - or drop out
<http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/03/why-do-so-many-american
s-drop-out-of-college/255226/>  - of college, which has become the
prerequisite for a middle-class existence. 

Which is why the publication of a new book, entitled "How Children Succeed
<http://www.hmhbooks.com/howchildrensucceed/index.html> ," written by Paul
Tough, a former editor of the Times Magazine, is such a timely reminder that
education remains the country's most critical issue. In "How Children
Succeed," Tough argues that simply teaching math and reading - the so-called
cognitive skills - isn't nearly enough, especially for children who have
grown up enduring the stresses of poverty. In fact, it might not even be the
most important thing. 

Rather, tapping into a great deal of recent research, Tough writes that the
most important things to develop in students are "noncognitive skills,"
which Tough labels as "character." Many of the people who have done the
research or are running the programs that Tough admires have different ways
of expressing those skills. But they are essentially character traits that
are necessary to succeed not just in school, but in life. Jeff Nelson, who
runs a program in partnership with 23 Chicago high schools called OneGoal
<http://www.onegoalgraduation.org/formerly-us-empowered/> , which works to
improve student achievement and helps students get into college, describes
these traits as "resilience, integrity, resourcefulness, professionalism and
ambition." "They are the linchpin of what we do," Nelson told me. Nelson
calls them "leadership skills." Tough uses the word "grit" a lot. 

On some level, these are traits we all try to instill in our children.
(Indeed, Tough devotes a section of his book to the anxiety of many
upper-middle-class parents that they are failing in this regard.) But poor
children too often don't have parents who can serve that role. They develop
habits that impede their ability to learn. Often they can't even see what
the point of learning is. They act indifferently or hostile in school,
though that often masks feelings of hopelessness and anxiety. 

What was most surprising to me was Tough's insistence, bolstered by his
reporting, that character is not something you have to learn as a small
child, or are born with, but can be instilled even in teenagers who have had
extraordinarily difficult lives and had no previous grounding in these
traits. We get to meet a number of children who, with the help of a program
or a mentor who stresses character, have turned their lives around
remarkably. We meet Dave Levin, the founder of KIPP <http://www.kipp.org/> ,
perhaps the best charter school
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/c/charter_scho
ols/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>  chain in the country, whose earliest
graduates run into problems when they get to college - only 21 percent of
them had graduated after six years, according to Tough - and then begins
stressing character traits to turn things around. 

And we also meet Nelson, the founder of OneGoal, which takes disadvantaged
students when they are juniors in high school - most of whom believe that
college is an unattainable goal - and transforms them into responsible young
adults who can succeed in good universities. OneGoal has a "persistence rate
<http://www.onegoalgraduation.org/onegoal-results/> ," as Nelson calls it,
of 85 percent, meaning that that's the percentage of students from OneGoal
who are making their way through college. (The program hasn't been around
long enough to have a graduation rate.) By comparison, nationally, around
only 8 percent of the poorest students ever graduate from college. Nelson
told me that OneGoal is expanding to Houston next year, and it hopes to be
in five cities by 2017. 

I hope it happens. Tough's book is utterly convincing that if disadvantaged
students can learn the noncognitive skills that will allow them to persist
in the face of difficulties - to reach for a goal even though it may off in
the distance, to strive for something - they can achieve a better life. 

It is easy to get discouraged about the state of education in America. Maybe
that's why the presidential candidates aren't stressing it. Which is the
other thing about "How Children Succeed." It's a source of optimism. 

-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com

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