Poverty and Educational Outcomes

Prof. Bill CarbonaroDept. of SociologyApril 2008

Poverty and Educational Outcomes

OUTCOMES Academic Achievement (How much students

learn) Test scores, grades, cognitive abilities (e.g., literacy,

numeracy, problem solving, IQ)

Educational Attainment (How far students go in school)

High School, GED, Two-Year College, Bachelor’s, Graduate School

Quiz #1: Test Scores and Family Income

TEST

SCORES

INCOME

Poverty

(1) Which line (a, b, or c) looks most correct?

(2) Explain why.

A: Diminishing Returns

B: Linear Relationship

C: Threshold Effect

Income and Test Scores

0

20

40

60

mean of testscores

<$10K 10-15K 15-20K 20-25K 25-35K 35-50K 50-75K75-100K100-200K>200K

Relationship between Income and Test Scores is LINEAR – (1) There is no special penalty for poverty status, and (2) No diminishing returns to income

TENTH GRADE READING/MATH SCORES (2002)

Income and Test ScoresMEAN DIFFERENCES across groups, lots of overlap in the distributions

SES vs. Poverty

Effects of POVERTY are UNDERSTUDIED relative to the effects of SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS (SES)?

Is poverty equivalent to low SES?

SES Parents’ Education Parents’ Income Parents’ Occupation

KEY POINT: Income (and poverty status) is more variable over time; the other components of SES (education and occupation) are more fixed

POVERTY

Table 16-2. Percentage of children who demonstrate specific mathematics knowledge and skills, by child, family, and school characteristics: Spring 5th grade, 2004

 

Characteristic

Multiplication Place Rate and Area and

and division value measurement Fractions volume

    Total 92.4 73.5 42.9 13.2 1.8

Mother’s highest level of education, spring 2004

  Less than high school (22.2 % Poor) 80.2 47.0 18.5 3.5 0.5

  High school diploma or equiv (9.2%) 90.3 67.5 33.9 7.2 0.8

  Some college or vocational technical degree (5.9%) 94.4 76.2 42.9 10.8 1.3

  Bachelor’s degree or higher (3.2%) 98.3 90.4 65.8 28.4 4.0

Poverty status,2 kindergarten through spring 2004

  Below, all rounds 81.1 44.8 16.1 3.0! 0.2

  In and out of poverty 89.6 65.6 31.3 6.2 0.6

  At or above, all rounds 96.2 84.0 55.1 19.2 2.7

Education is also strongly related to academic skills

Duration of exposure to poverty (short-term vs. long term poor)

Causal Pathways

POVERTYMEDIATING VARIABLES

???

EDUCATIONALOUTCOMES

Kozol: “Savage Inequalities” Model

POVERTYPOOR

SCHOOLS

POOR EDUCATIONAL

OUTCOMES

CLARIFICATION: The main idea here is that schools CAN COMPENSATE for disadvantages of family life. If we make schools good enough, they can offset the pernicious effects of poverty on achievement and attainment. Kozol argues that our current system reinforces and likely exacerbates pre-existing inequalities in family background.

School Sorting and Income: Class Segregation

School Sorting and Income: Class Segregation

25% Chance5% Chance

School Poverty and Achievement

21.2% 16.7% 23% 18.5% 20.7% =100%

Family Background vs. School Context:

INCOME ACHIEVEMENT

SCHOOL COMPOSITION

HYPOTHESIS 1: RELATIONSHIP IS LARGELY SPURIOUS

Family Background vs. School Context

INCOME ACHIEVEMENT SCHOOL

COMPOSITION and SCHOOL

QUALITY

HYPOTHESIS 2: INCOME SORTS STUDENTS INTO DIFFERENT TYPES OF SCHOOLS; SCHOOLS TRANSLATE INCOME DIFFERENCES INTO ACHIEVEMENT DIFFERENCES

Family Background vs. School Context

INCOMEACHIEVEMENT

SCHOOL COMPOSITION and SCHOOL

QUALITY

HYPOTHESIS 3: INCOME HAS BOTH DIRECT AND INDIRECT EFFECTS ON ACHIEVEMENT

Quiz #2

Which hypothesis is best supported by the data?

Explain why

Achievement by School SES Composition

Higher SES families appear more sensitive to school SES

Variation in Achievement by School SES

50%

Lots of variation within schools; achievement distributions for different types of schools overlap substantially

The Coleman Report (1966)

MAIN FINDINGSFamily Background is the STRONGEST

predictor of student achievement Most of the variation in achievement is

WITHIN (80%), not BETWEEN (20%) schoolsOnly a few school characteristics mattered for

achievement YES: Race and SES composition, teacher quality

(verbal ability) NO: School spending, resources, etc.

Beyond the Coleman Report

Subsequent Research has supported the main conclusions of Coleman’s research

SOME CAVEATS While most of the variation in achievement

levels is WITHIN schools, most of the variation in achievement GROWTH is BETWEEN schools, not WITHIN Different in rates of achievement GROWTH are largely explained differences in school factors

More recent evidence suggest that SCHOOL SPENDING is modestly related to achievement

Family Background vs. School Context

INCOME

(SES)

ACHIEVEMENT

SCHOOL COMPOSITION and SCHOOL

QUALITY

HYPOTHESIS 3 (DIRECT AND INDIRECT EFFECTS) HAS THE MOST SUPPORT

+++

+ +

** SES has much stronger effects that simply income alone (apart from parents’ education and occupation)

How Can we Explain Kozol?

EXTREME OUTLIERS TRUE: The most disadvantaged groups are in very

bad shape, and they desperately need our attention ALSO TRUE: they are a small part of a much larger

problem Long term, inner city poor make up a small portion of the poor in America (7-15%)

BUT, THE POOR ARE A HETERGENEOUS POPULATION Being “income poor” does NOT necessarily mean that

you are low on other aspects of SES This heterogeneity weakens the overall relationship

between poverty and achievement

** KOZOL is right – these schools are very bad, and the students in them desperately need our help

A Theory of Student Learning

THREE KEY INGREDIENTS1. OTL (Opportunities to Learn)

Structure (Malleable, but not by students) Between and within: schools, families, neighborhoods, peer

groups

2. EFFORT Agency (within our control) . . . But also sensitive to social context via expectations family,

peers, teachers, neighborhoods, etc.

3. ABILITY Learning Rate vs. Capacity Innate vs. Learned

SES and poverty affect ALL THREE

OTL: Spending across DistrictsSpending between low and high poverty districts not that different on average

Spending may NOT be the best measure of school based OTL

OTL: School Conditions and School Poverty

OVERALL – Most schools are in reasonably good condition. High Poverty schools slightly more likely to be in bad shape.

OTL: Resources ConstraintsLearning hindered by: poor building conditions, poor heat/light/air, poor fine arts facilities, poor science labs, lack of space, poor library, lack of texts, few computers, lack of multimedia, lack of discipline, and vocational facilities.

OTL: Teacher Quality and School PovertyTable 15-2. Percentage of public school 4th-graders, by percentage of students in the school eligible for free or reduced-price lunch and selected teacher and school characteristics: 2005

 

Students in school eligible to receive free or reduced-price lunch

Teacher or school characteristic

10 percent 11–25 26–50 51–75 More than 75

or less percent percent percent percent

 

    Total 100 100 100 100 100

Number of years spent teaching

  4 or less 17 17 18 22 28

  5–9 26 24 23 24 31

  10–19 29 28 28 27 24

  20 or more 28 31 31 27 18

PROB: “Years teaching” not a great measure of teacher quality

OTL: Teacher Quality and School Poverty

OUT OF FIELD TEACHING (Much better measure of teacher quality)

OTL: Teacher Quality and School Poverty

NATIONAL TEACHER EXAMS IN NEW YORK CITY

Highest School Poverty Quintile

42% of Elementary School Teachers failed AT LEAST ONCE

Lowest School Poverty Quintile

16% of elementary School Teachers EVER FAILED

** TEACHER TESTS ARE VERY GOOD PREDICTORS OF TEACHERS QUALITY

OTL: Home EnvironmentFamily risk factors include living below the poverty level, primary home language was non-English, mother’s highest education was less than a high school diploma/GED, and living in a single-parent household, as measured in kindergarten.

SES achievement gaps are already present when students start kindergarten

And they get bigger as students progress through school

Summer Learning vs. School Learning

AC

HIE

VE

ME

NT

K G1 G2 G3Summer Summer Summer Summer

HIGH SES

LOW SES

Both high and low SES experience higher rates of achievement growth during the school year

Students in these studies are tested at the beginning and end of each school year

Summer Learning vs. School Learning

ACHIEVEMENT GAP BETWEEN HIGH AND LOW SES STUDENTS FROM GRADES 1-5

-10

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

Summer Gap School Gap

Math

Reading

The SES gap is almost entirely attributable to unequal rates of growth during the summer

High and low SES student learn at roughly the same rate during the school year.

Home Environment

Measured at Nine Months Old

Home EnvironmentEARLY LITERACY ACTIVITIES: Percentage of prekindergarten children ages 3–5 who participated in home literacy activities with a family member three or more times in the preceding week, by poverty status: 1993 and 2005

A More Nuanced View: Duration of Exposure and Timing of Poverty Duration of poverty and outcomes

The longer the exposure to poverty, the more negative the effect on students outcomes

** Since most poverty is short-term, the overall effects are small for most of the distribution

A More Nuanced View: The Timing of Poverty and its Effects EARLY (Pre-K and Elementary)

Significant effect on student ability (i.e., how fast they learn and process information)

Likely due to interactions between genes and the environment

LATE (Middle School and Adolescence) Significant affects on achievement (i.e., school based

learning) Likely due to access to learning opportunities in

school and student effort

Peers, Neighborhoods, and Poverty

Friends, Peers, and “the Crowd”

ADOLESCENTS are influenced more heavily by friends, peers, and “the crowd” than their families

HOWEVER – families are often instrumental in DETERMINING their children’s friends/peers

Peers, Neighborhoods, and Poverty

FAMILIES shape friends, peers via:

Choice of residence, neighborhoods

Choice of school Shaping students’ tastes,

expectations Monitoring, supervision of

activities

POVERTY (and SES) IMPOSES CONSTRAINTS ON ALL OF THESE

Poverty and Educational Attainment EDUCATION is the best

defense against POVERTY as an adult

SES Quartiles and College Attainment

00.10.20.30.40.50.60.70.80.9

1

No PSE Some PSE BA or More

Low SES-Q

Middle SES-Q

High SES-Q

Enormous SES differences in post-secondary education (PSE)

Attainment and SES

BACHELORS

Low-achieving/high SES students and high achieving/low SES students have the same chance of getting a BA!

Low SES students: Chances of BA attainment much more sensitive to school experiences

How Does Poverty Affect Educational Attainment?

DIRECTLY – Insufficient resources to pay for college

INDIRECTLY – Through low achievement and self-selection out of the college pipeline

Thinking about Poverty and Educational Outcomes

It’s all about probabilitistic (NOT DETERMINISTIC) relationships!

IMAGINE A GAME OF CARDS

POVERTY DECK

16 P

84 N-P

P

N-P

HOME ENVIRON

MENT

P

HOME ENVIRON

MENT

N-P

FRIENDS, PEERS

N-P

FRIENDS, PEERS

P

SCHOOL N-P

SCHOOL

P

RESOURCE DECKS

Thinking about Poverty and Educational Outcomes

If you draw a “P” card, the resource decks are stacked against you; if you draw a N-P, they are stacked in your favor

Our EDUCATIONAL OUTCOMES are shaped by how we all play the game:

(1) How you play your hand matters (choices), but (2) So does the HAND that you are DEALT (structure)!

Students in poverty can succeed, but the odds are stacked against them.

What to Do?

CHANGE THE RULES OF THE GAME

POVERTY DECK

16 P

84 N-P

P

N-P

HOME ENVIRON

MENT

FRIENDS, PEERS SCHOOL

RESOURCE DECKS

CHANGE THE ODDS

Make everyone pick from the same deck

What to Do?

1. Prevent families from falling into poverty in the first place (Changes in labor markets, family support systems)

2. Avoid SES segregation of students; concentrations of students in poverty (by school or neighborhood) should be avoided

3. Provide extra resources to help poor students succeed in K-12 (More instructional time, more time with high quality teachers, tutoring, etc.)

4. Give poor students HOPE: (a) labor market opportunities and (b) vocational and post-secondary schooling opportunities

What to Do?

HOW DO WE ACCOMPLISH ITEMS 1-4?!?

A reasonable first step: Persuade the public that high levels of inequality are bad for the economy.

GOOD NEWS an easy case to make!