child care - Digital Library Collections

.... 8 POT L I G H TON ED U CAT ION
scores between 17·year-ld Black and White students was reduced by more than half between
1971 and 1988. Had progress continued at the same pace throughout the 1990s, the scores for
the two groups would have equalized in 1998. Unfortunately, gains leveled off, and as the end of
the decade approaches, the reading score gap remains about where it was at the beginning.
Similarly, the National Education Goals Report released in 1997 indicates essentially no
change in the number of high school graduates between 1990 and 1996. Each school day more
than 2,700 students drop out.
Although more young people ofall racial, ethnic, and economic backgrounds attend college
today, only one in three high school graduates completes a college degree (compared with about
one in four in 1973). That leaves two-thirds of high school graduates without the education
necessary for the majority of new jobs in the next century. Children from low-income families
in particular often lack the means and the encouragement to pursue higher education. The
most recent data from the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) indicate that only about
one-third ofyouths from low-income families are in college in the October following high school
graduation, compared with more than 80 percent from high-income families. The DOE also
reported that in 1996 the percentage ofWhite high school graduates who completed a four-year
college degree was double that ofBlacks and Hispanics.
Just as a college degree is becoming more critical to obtaining a well-paying job, higher
education costs have escalated, soaring beyond the reach ofmany low-income students. According
to the Education Trust, average tuition and fees at public two-year colleges, the least
expensive higher education option, have more than tripled since 1980. Costs at four-year public
colleges have risen to more than three and a half times their 1980 levels. Meanwhile, student
financial assistance has shifted from grants to loans. In 1979 the maximum federal Pell grant to
low-income students covered 77 percent ofthe average cost ofattending public college; in 1993,
only 35 percent. In 1998, as Congress considers reauthorization of the Higher Education Act,
it will have an important opportunity to make higher education more attainable for all students.
Despite repeated commissions, studies, and reports, efforts to improve America's schools
seem to have stalled. In 1990 President Bush and the 50 governors established education goals
for the year 2000. The 1997 report of the National Education Goals Panel, however, showed
slim progress in six areas, deterioration in seven, and no change in seven others. In 1997
President Clinton and Congress struggled over the mechanism for establishing national standardized
tests to measure academic achievement but paid little attention to ensuring that
students actually learn.
Shortchanging poor and minority children. While the nation's overall educational outlook is
cause for concern, the plight of poor children and minority children is even bleaker. As
disparities in school performance appear to be growing again, some suggest that nonschool
problems such as poverty, family turmoil, violent neighborhoods, and drug abuse explain the
lagging performance of disadvantaged children. These conditions do take a heavy toll. Two
recent CDF publications, Poverty Matters and Wasting America's Future, document how poverty
robs poor children of educational opportunities. Good schools, however, can help children
transcend difficult circumstances.
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