Poverty is not just a lack of money. It鈥檚 a shorthand for a host of other problems鈥攕canty dinners and crumbling housing projects, chronic illnesses, and depressed or angry parents鈥攖hat can interfere with a child鈥檚 ability to learn.
Educators and researchers in several of the nation鈥檚 largest districts are trying to look at schools based on a fuller picture of children鈥檚 experiences, rather than only seeing poverty as a label.
In a study released today, researchers at the Center for New York City Affairs linked data from the U.S. Census Bureau鈥檚 American Community Survey, the school district, and the municipal housing, homeless services, and children鈥檚 services agencies, and matched the data with 748 elementary schools (that use geographic attendance areas).
Researchers found that 18 factors in a student鈥檚 school and neighborhood strongly predicted his or her likelihood of chronic absenteeism and the student鈥檚 scores on New York鈥檚 accountability tests that are aligned with the Common Core State Standards. Taken together, these indicators create a measure of the 鈥渞isk load鈥� in each of the Big Apple鈥檚 elementary schools.
If you think about the community context, you would be able to better understand when students come into the school building, what they are carrying with them,鈥� said Kim Nauer, the education research director of the Center for New York City Affairs at The New School, and an author of the study.
The Center for New York City Affairs identified 18 school and neighborhood indicators that contribute to high risk in urban schools with high concentration of poverty. The indicators are intended to help administrators and policymakers find areas for improvement, such as high teacher turnover or student suspensions.
School Factors:
1. Students eligible for free lunch
2. Students known to be in temporary housing
3. Students eligible for welfare benefits from the city Human Resources Administration
4. Special education students
5. Black or Hispanic students
6. Principal turnover
7. Teacher turnover
8. Student turnover
9. Student suspensions
10. Safety score on the district鈥檚 Learning Environment Survey
11. Engagement score on the Learning Environment Survey
Neighborhood Factors:
12.Involvement with the city鈥檚 Administration for Children鈥檚 Services
13. Poverty rate according to the U.S. Census for the school鈥檚 attendance area
14. Adult education levels
15. Professional employment
16. Male unemployment
17. Presence of public housing in a school鈥檚 attendance area
18. Presence of a homeless shelter in a school鈥檚 attendance area
New York City is the latest in a growing number of urban districts attempting to find better indicators of strength and challenge in low-performing schools.
For example, the University of Chicago鈥檚 Consortium on Chicago School Research aligns U.S. Census block data with employment, crime, and school data to separate poor-but-stable communities and schools from the ones they call 鈥渢ruly disadvantaged.鈥�
The percentage of students who receive free and reduced-price lunch is a 鈥渧ery rough indicator,鈥� said Elaine M. Allensworth, the director of the consortium. 鈥淚t doesn鈥檛 differentiate schools or students very well in a school or district where 85 percent of the students get free lunch. In a district like Chicago, we have some neighborhoods where all the students get free lunch but it鈥檚 still working poor鈥攁nd some neighborhoods where the male unemployment rate is above 60 percent and almost all families are below the poverty line. Often, those communities have very high crime rates and few neighborhood institutions that are very viable. That鈥檚 a very different situation.鈥�
The University of Pennsylvania鈥檚 Kids Integrated Data System, or KIDS, a model for New York and Chicago鈥檚 work, incorporates real-time data from seven city agencies and the school district of Philadelphia.
Multiple Factors
In a separate 2013 study, John W. Fantuzzo, a human-relations professor and the director of the University of Pennsylvania鈥檚 Child Research Center, compared a set of urban high-poverty schools based on factors including birth risks, low parental education levels, homelessness, maltreatment, and lead exposure. Once those risk factors were taken into account, poverty and race were no longer significantly associated with reading achievement or school attendance.
鈥淲e鈥檝e been [using race and poverty as a proxy for disadvantage] for decades, and it鈥檚 done nothing,鈥� Mr. Fantuzzo said. 鈥� 鈥極h, the poor kids are poor, the black kids and Latino kids do badly.鈥� That鈥檚 immoral to me. These kids are having experiences, 鈥� and we have to make those visible. We need actionable intelligence.鈥�
Mr. Fantuzzo, who consulted early on with the New York researchers, said they made good use of the 鈥渓ow-hanging fruit鈥� that often is collected but unused in both government agencies and the state P-20 longitudinal-data systems. In Philadelphia, the KIDS system was used to develop a measure of student engagement鈥攚hich has been found to be a buffer against the negative effects of poverty. The measure is now being applied to the district鈥檚 kindergarten report cards and which Mr. Fantuzzo advocates including in K-12 report cards as well.
鈥淔rom a child-development perspective, it鈥檚 not status that disadvantages you or advantages you. It鈥檚 your experiences 鈥� abuse or homelessness. 鈥� Some very concrete sets of experiences are more powerful predictors than free and reduced lunch,鈥� Mr. Fantuzzo said. 鈥淲e have to build capacities that make visible important, mutable variables that we can do something about.鈥�
Hidden Differences
In the New York City study, for instance, P.S. 92 in the Bronx had an 82 percent poverty rate, and only 5 percent of its students passed the new state test aligned to the common standards in reading, with only 4 percent passing in math in 2012-13. However, P.S. 63 Author鈥檚 Academy in the South Bronx, where the poverty rate is 96 percent, had five times higher passing rates in both reading and math in 2012-13.
Why? A look at the schools鈥� relative risk loads may give a few hints. P.S. 92 serves homeless shelters, and nearly twice as many students are chronically absent鈥�46 percent compared with Author鈥檚 Academy鈥檚 28 percent. Moreover, P.S. 92鈥檚 teacher turnover is more than double that of its southern neighbor, with 21 percent of teachers having taught at a different school the prior year, versus 10 percent new teachers at P.S. 63. It鈥檚 not clear whether any individual factor causes the gaps in individual risk factors among schools, but the indicators point to differences in the supports and interventions each school needs.
鈥淓veryone talks about the achievement gap and says, 鈥榃ell, it鈥檚 up to the teachers to make these kids smarter.鈥� But if you look at the risk-load gap, it explains the achievement gap,鈥� said Ms. Nauer of the Center for New York City Affairs. 鈥淪o then, what do you do? You create a series of things within the classroom environment that are known to be protective or helpful to students who have these risks.鈥�
For example, Pat Mitchell, the principal of P.S. 48 Wordsworth in Jamaica, in the city鈥檚 Queens borough, 鈥渟erves some of the lowest-income kids in the city but her kids have less of a risk-load burden,鈥� Ms. Nauer said.
The school has 16 different risk factors鈥攖he same as P.S. 92鈥攂ut its rate of chronic absenteeism is 26 percent.
鈥淪he鈥檚 interesting because she has done everything right in focusing on both attendance and classroom instruction. Her attendance and test scores have been steadily improving,鈥� added Ms. Nauer, referring to Ms. Mitchell.
View From P.S. 92
When Ms. Mitchell took over as principal in 2007, she found the school didn鈥檛 have the continuity to be self-reflective. Among its many risk factors were high student, teacher, and principal mobility鈥擬s. Mitchell herself was the fifth leader in eight years鈥攁nd the principal welcomed the data to 鈥減eel back the layers to find out why a problem is happening.鈥�
鈥淪ome of the factors, most people don鈥檛 even consider,鈥� she said. 鈥淪tudents were identified for low attendance but not tracked over time.
鈥淭here are things we cannot touch: how much a family makes, how many adults are in the home, how many jobs they have to have to pay for rent,鈥� Ms. Mitchell said. 鈥淲e can鈥檛 do anything about that. What surprised me were the things that I had never thought about before that have a huge effect on the school culture.鈥�
The school, for instance, became one of the pilot campuses for an initiative during Mayor Michael Bloomberg鈥檚 administration to improve attendance. Digging into the school鈥檚 chronic absenteeism got Ms. Mitchell and her staff talking about the ways they contributed to student absenteeism, through approaches to discipline and asthma.
鈥淚 never even thought about the number of children who are being suspended. I just thought, 鈥榃e have scholars who are misbehaving and we have to suspend them.鈥� I never realized how it affected the whole school culture,鈥� she said.
Now, the school works to find in-school discipline and has a team monitoring chronically absent students, praising every improvement they find.
鈥淪cholars are so shocked when I say, 鈥榊ou were absent 17 days last year and only one this year, and I鈥檓 so proud of you,鈥� 鈥� Ms. Mitchell said.
The New York study also recommends that Mayor Bill de Blasio work with all schools to analyze child-welfare agencies systemwide in light of the indicators. 鈥淚 hope it will be helpful in making [school] principals aware of the questions they should be asking,鈥� Ms. Nauer said. 鈥淭he whole endgame here is to make school as positive as possible for the little guys and make sure they are not in a cycle of failure by the time they get to middle school.鈥�
