A new book by two of my favorite researchers, Abigail and Stephan Thernstrom, is now available on Amazon.com, and a favorable review by Matt Rosenberg has already appeared in the Seattle Times:
The news is not good for K-12 public education in Washington state. A new report funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation shows Washington ranks 39th out of 50 states in its 2001 high-school-graduation rate, at 66 percent. The report also estimates that a scant one-quarter of 2001 Washington high-school students graduated college-ready. That's very different from merely graduating...
The Gates Foundation-funded working paper is titled "Public High School Graduation and College Readiness Rates in the United States." The lead author is Jay Greene, an education researcher and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research...
Greene's report also cross-analyzes the new data by race. Nationally and in many states — including Washington — high-school graduation and college readiness rates are markedly lower for African Americans and Hispanics versus whites and Asians...
In their new book out next week, scholars Abigail and Stephan Thernstrom highlight the handful of U.S. public schools that turn at-risk minority kids into high achievers. In "No Excuses — Closing the Racial Gap in Learning," they report these are predominantly charter schools, with high academic and behavioral standards...
They stress "academic culture and the quality of the teachers, which is not likely to improve unless the rules governing hiring, firing, and salaries, as well as working conditions, are changed..."
And the Thernstroms reinforce a well-known, yet vital point: Asian students do better than any others — including whites — because of resolute family expectations. The Thernstroms say "hard work is a culturally transferable trait."
Posted by kswygert at October 8, 2003 03:31 PM