During slavery, under some of the worse conditions known to man, slaves taught their kids to read by candlelight under the threat of death. And those kids learned.

On the heels of the great depression, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s new deal invigorated educational opportunities for poor white kids in places like Appalachia. And those kids learned.

Following the Vietnam War, thousands of Vietnamese refugees came to our nation. The vast majority of those children came to America unable to speak English and often lived with several families under one roof. And those kids learned.

In California, folks like Cesar Chavez fought for better working conditions for Latino migrant workers. While those families struggled to make ends meet, many strived to put their children in schools that would meet their needs. And those kids learned.

Throughout the history of our country, the unifying promise of America has been the hope for a better life for one’s children through education. Especially those children trapped in poverty. At every turn in our history, kids in poverty have demonstrated their ability to learn and succeed.

Today, as we struggle with what ails many of our schools, more and more emphasis is being placed on the linkage between poverty and education. It seems as though each week there is a new study trumpeting the difficulty of teaching low income children and; the fact that poverty needs to be taken into account when we delve into tissues pertaining to teacher effectiveness and the quality of a school’s overall performance.

I get all that. And I do agree that there must be better coordination of services between schools and those entities that help families in poverty. Without question, Geoffrey Canada’s Harlem Children Zone should be replicated all over America. Geoffrey understands the need to take a holistic, community wide approach to health care, poverty and education. From his innovative Baby College for expectant mothers to his successful charter school to his offering of adult centered services, Geoffrey fills a much needed gap for thousands of Harlem families.

But poverty cannot be used as an excuse for bad teaching or our failure to better educate children who live in poverty. Frankly, some of the growing articles and studies on this topic often times engage in excuse-making and justify the ‘throwing up of the hands’ as it relates to trying to teach kids in poverty. Isn’t it curious that we are hearing more about poverty being a factor in a child’s educational experience as we talk more and more about linking teacher evaluations to their students performance? I discussed this issue with a terrific school leader in St. Louis who bemoaned the fact that far too many people blatantly say to her things like “It’s impossible to educate poor black kids,” and “You need to change your school’s demographic to have any real success.” To me, this line of thinking is ridiculous. All kids can learn. But all kids cannot learn in the same way. It is incumbent upon us to meet these kids where they are and utilize the approach that best serves them, including offering more quality options for them. There are many teachers who have worked their magic with kids who come from the most challenged environments imaginable. From my vantage point, as opposed to using poverty as the easy reason why some kids in poverty can’t learn, let’s put an excellent teacher in the classroom of every low income child in America and see what happens. And once and for all, let’s stop talking about poverty being a barrier to positive educational outcomes for our kids.

The results are unfortunately substandard as usual. For both 8th grade and 12th grade, only 27% scored proficient or above. It is depressing to report that this means only about half of the nation’s student population only has a basic knowledge and understanding of writing. Basic achievement is defined as “partial mastery of prerequisite knowledge and skills that are fundamental for proficient work at each grade,” which, in other words, means not at grade level. What’s worse is that about 20% of students scored below this basic level.

The results also indicate a gap between economic groups, as measured by the federal standard of free and reduced lunch participants. Students participating in federal program scored 27 points lower than those that did not.

See results in greater detail and a statement from NCES Commissioner Jack Buckley on the NCES website.

Cincinnati’s public school system is featured as an Education Nation case study because of its holistic approach to education, beginning with wraparound services before children have even entered kindergarten.

But while the achievement claims made by the superintendent sound promising, there is still a lot of work to be done to ensure that all of Cincinnati’s students are achieving at grade level.

The data touted says the percentage of children deemed ready for kindergarten, has increased nine percentage points since 2005 based on a standardized kindergarten readiness test. However, the total number of students deemed ready is still a very low 50 percent.

Eighth-grade math scores for Cincinnati public school students have increased 24 percentage points over the same period. It’s hard to know if that is a direct correlation to the wraparound services provided by these organizations, such as Strive, which estimates that around 100,000 children and students participate in the partnership in some fashion.

It’s clear from reviewing the Ohio Department of Education school district level report cards that at least over three years (2008-09 through 2010-11), proficiency in Cincinnati has increased modestly in most grades and in both math and reading. Third graders increased their proficiency in reading and math by ten percent over a three-year period, and tenth graders increased their proficiency by eight points in reading and seven points in math. However there is no record of scores over the last five years and tests have changed — dramatically. The question is how is this being measured?

More importantly, the urban district has affluent schools and poor schools. What is the disaggregated data for poor and wealthy schools? Education Trust did a path breaking report on this issue several years ago and found that many overall district’s progress actually masked static or declining scores and progress at some of the less advantaged schools. To truly understand Cincy’s progress we must look at school by school level data, understand the definition of proficiency, and whether or not the tests students are taking are the same or different.

Last year there were 31 charter schools in Cincinnati serving nearly 10,000 students, clearly showing the need for educational options. The Cincinnati school district’s website has one vague sentence about their achievement: “Cincinnati Public Schools’ students score higher on state tests than students in charter schools.” However, looking further this statement does not necessarily reflect what is really happening on the ground. Value-added data analysis by the OAPCS show that Cincinnati charter schools outperformed district schools on 4 of the past 5 years, and more charter schools than public schools exceeded their expected amount of growth. Forty-one percent of charter schools exceeded their growth targets, compared to only 30 percent of district schools.

Ohio does afford parents more power than most states and many have chosen to attend charters and private schools with publicly sanctioned programs that allow them to pick schools that best meet the needs of their children. In addition to students who attend charter schools, about 3,000 kids have chosen to leave Cincinnati public schools through an Ed Choice Scholarship and those who left are more likely to have been struggling, not succeeding. The new special needs scholarship had 199 applications from Cincinnati, the most of any Ohio school district. Parents in Cincy are clamoring for options because the public schools clearly are lacking.

Kudos to those advancing the education mission in Cincinnati but let’s be sure we know the real scoop before saying we’re on the right trajectory.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, while congratulating traditional district schools for making improvements on state test scores, on Tuesday reiterated his support for more charter schools.

“I think they demonstrate again and again and again that that model gives superior results,” Mr. Bloomberg said at a news conference at the Tweed Courthouse, where he discussed the state test results.

For the third year, the city’s charter schools outperformed traditional public schools in math and English, and the spread in results between the two groups has increased.

In math, 72 percent of charter school students passed the state tests this year, compared with 60 percent of traditional public school students. In English, 51.5 percent of charter school students passed this year’s tests compared with 46.9 percent of traditional public school students. (About 30,000 charter school students took the tests; 400,000 students took the tests in traditional public schools.)

“What we’re seeing, and what we’ve seen all along,” said James Merriman, chief executive officer of the New York City Charter School Center, “is that the longer school day and longer school year that characterizes charter schools, as well as simply a focus on instruction and the sense of having a schoolwide culture that everyone buys into, results in these kinds of achievement scores.”

Critics of charter schools argue that charters attract some of the best students from the community, while enrolling far fewer students with special needs and English language learners than do traditional public schools.

Mr. Merriman said that he understood these concerns, and that demographics do matter when discussing data.

But with that in mind, he said, the fact that charter school students have improved by about nine percentage points on both the English language arts and math tests since 2010 “is cause for optimism in the charter sector.”

• Six percent of Florida’s public school students are enrolled in charter schools.
• The percent of charter schools receiving a state grade of ‘A’ has increased from 42 percent in 2002-03 to 58 percent in 2010-11.
• More charter schools are receiving an ‘A’ than conventional public schools.
• More charter school students have consistently received a three or higher on the reading portion of the FCAT than their conventional school counterparts.
• Florida charter schools also ranked higher (in terms of how many students got a three or higher on their FCAT) when the study broke down the data into grades and subgroups by race.
• Charter school students outperformed traditional public school students in 50 of the 54 comparisons in this report.

Overall, charters have been improving academically year by year and have taken the lead in most subjects and across most sub-groups. It’s no wonder that charter schools are in high demand throughout the Sunshine State. Click here for the complete list of charter schools in Florida.

Pennsylvania is poised to be the next big battleground for serious, and potentially controversial, school reforms. Next to Indiana, Ohio and Wisconsin, if the legislature adopts the Corbett education plan, the state will be the next big prominent player in national school reform and the leader on the East Coast.

President of The Center for Education Reform (CER) Jeanne Allen was on the ground visiting with Pennsylvania House Leadership and other House members on Monday, November 14, to express the importance of pending education reform proposals for Pennsylvania children.

“At the Center for Education Reform, we’re both watching and working in the field to ensure that sound policy advances are adopted for all children, in every state. In Pennsylvania, we’ve been actively engaged for years in developing charter schools,” said Allen. “Improvements to that original law, which have been tested over time, are now pending and we’re hopeful that the state will soon stand with others who permit universities and other independent entities to create charter schools.”

Public school reform is an important proposal to allow parents, who feel trapped in failing schools by virtue of their zip code, to access schools of their choice. While limited to children in the lowest 5% of performing school districts, SB 1 ensures that those children, who are currently forced to attend a failing school, do not have to stay there any longer. The state’s popular business tax credit program, which funds additional scholarships for middle- and low- income families, also grows.

The teacher evaluation proposal is what will hopefully be a first step in a long line of important teacher quality initiatives that follow recommendations of some of the leading education researchers in the nation.

It’s important that Pennsylvanians have context for the pending proposals:

Academic Performance: On the 2011 “Nation’s Report Card” fewer than half of all fourth graders are proficient in reading and math, and only 38% of 8th graders meet the standards.

Charter Schools: Pennsylvania currently has the 12th-strongest ranked charter school law, yet the deficiencies in the law have restricted quality growth and allowed other states to outpace Pennsylvania in charter growth.

Multiple Authorizers: If adopted, the proposed charter changes would make Pennsylvania the 17th charter law, out of 42, to allow for multiple authorizers. This promotes a checks and balances system in charter approval, oversight and renewal decisions. The goal is to give parents the most options, and having multiple sponsors helps reach that potential.

School Choice Programs: With passage, the opportunity scholarship program would make Pennsylvania the 3rd state to provide school choice statewide. In addition, it becomes the 21st program to provide some form of school choice.

Teacher Evaluations: A growing number of states require districts to tie student performance to their public school teachers’ evaluations ensuring that high quality teachers earn what they deserve. Pennsylvania can join a long list of states that have implemented measures to reform teacher tenure policies, as well, which is good for students, good for teachers.

“Policy makers throughout the U.S. are seeing growing numbers in student achievement in states that have adopted similar, bold reforms. Pennsylvania will experience the same success in its students with these initiatives,” said Allen.

The study explains that the higher graduation rate can be attributed to a lowering of standards over the last 20 years. A Chicago Tribune editorial doesn’t think the study’s results are surprising, saying “Illinois sets the bar very low compared with other states, and in recent years has even lowered passing scores, creating phantom gains. Yes, we’ve dumbed down our tests. This should not come as a shock.”