Shocking Gaps
schools, was deficient. Nor did he
seem to have any sense of how wildly
fortunate his child was to attend such a
school.
A few decades ago, many Americans
talked about disparities in education
opportunities. Michael Harrington’s
book The Other America (1962/1997)
powered its way into Americans’
consciousness. Prominent writers like
Jonathan Kozol (1962, 1992) and Robert Coles (1977) screamed about these
disparities.
These days, only a few of my students at the Harvard Graduate School
of Education have heard of Coles, my
guess is only a handful have heard of
Harrington, and about half have never
heard of Kozol. It seems that fewer
people are screaming, and the screamers
aren’t being heard.
Most people in the United States
believe, at least rhetorically, in education equality—that all kids should learn
and compete on a roughly equal playing
field. Yet disparities between the most
affluent schools (both independent and
public) and schools in poor communities have grown nonsensically extreme.
And the issue isn’t only a lack of
equity and justice for disadvantaged
students, serious as that is. These kinds
of luxuries and this decadence are
unequivocally bad for wealthy kids as
well—a very real threat to their emotional and ethical development.
Disparities between the most a;uent
schools and schools in poor communities
have grown nonsensically extreme.
© OCEAN/CORBIS
How serious and pervasive are these
gaps and this extravagance? And what
can we do about it?
The View from Two
Sides of;the;Tracks
In the current economic crisis, many
schools in working-class and middle-class communities are cutting arts and
sports programs, laying off teachers, and
scrambling to provide basic supplies.
According to the Center on Education Policy, 70 percent of U.S. school
districts suffered budget cuts last year,
and 84 percent expect cuts this year
(Kristof,;2011).
Michael Rebell and Jessica Wolff
(2011) report that cuts have been huge
in 23 states, and many schools are now
charging fees for basic instructional
resources such as workbooks and the
use of lab equipment. Sometimes students must pay for advanced placement
courses, sports, or extracurricular
activities long deemed standard, clearly
shortchanging students who are unable
to afford them. Although research
shows that the relationship between
school funding and education quality is
complex—more money does not necessarily translate into greater learning—
these kinds of cuts clearly strain both
