Read Austan Goolsbee in today’s New York Times. Excerpt:
It seems that a child with talent can succeed no matter what the
parents’ skills are, as has been true for centuries in this country.
But parents whose English is poor have a big negative impact on the
below-average children.
Assessments supposedly show that programs like Head Start help cognitively gifted children but make little difference to the average kid. But who would ever admit such a result in public? Programs that are supposed to “lift all boats” only serve to heighten pre-existing distinctions. Overall, though, I suppose it’s possible that such programs do increase achievement. Just not in the way people think.
Gee, sure seems like a good reason to support either vouchers or
dispersal of non_english speakers to majority English schools.
Let’s get those buses rolling!
And Steve, it sure sounds like a great non-IQ based explanation
for some of those patterns that you explain using IQ differences…
Steve,
Even though border control is politically feasible, it’s infeasible practically. There are many nations with much smaller borders than ours that are unable to secure their borders. So should we do the impractical because it’s politically possible? Wasn’t one of the side effects of the last immigration reform in the 80s that because it was more difficult to enter/reenter the US that more people came as permanent residents with their families rather than as temporary workers? Tightening borders has been tried and failed, but you don’t seem to dismiss it for that reason. Is it because you agree with tightening borders, but not with bussing? Incidentally, I do not agree with bussing either.
I’m not an economist (philosopher by training), but this article is about as susceptible to a charge of confusing cause and effect as any I’ve seen lately. Could it possibly be that it’s not the parents’ lack of English that is the causal factor, but rather that there’s some other cause responsible for the low performing students’ low performance and poor English?
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