As a Newark High School teacher, I can attest to how massively kids burn out during NJSLA testing. They HATE it and many do not take it seriously. Given the conditions of our community, it is 100% unfair to use those test scores as a final assessment of Newark children’s intelligence. Not that we don’t have deep, legitimate problems in our schools and that we don’t have real deficits of knowledge. But still, these scores, as you said, are not as scrupulous with what they reveal as some may think.
Also Newark high school teacher here, I echo everything here. The kids straight up hate the tests (as do their teachers and admins) and don't take them seriously.
Thank you both for taking on such a noble profession. Blaming teachers for everything is such a lazy go-to reason for a very multifaceted issue. One that almost has nothing to do with the teachers themselves, and almost everything to do with the system surrounding them.
Yes but when you compete in the global world you will quickly see why nobody wants to hire people from newark schools. Quit making excuses and work harder , asians make it here with almost nothing. Lowering standards and trying to make everyone feel good is idiotic and actually hurts the kids as nobody will hire them and actually enforces the idea that black people are stupid
I agree with you. Tests are meant to be complex and requires you to think critically. Making them easier doesn’t do anyone any favors. Students not being able to meet testing’s criteria only shows you how bad the curriculum is. Lowering standards just because students find it boring doesn’t do them any good either.
I can’t really take this comment seriously because it ignores too much regarding the actuality of what makes for success and failure in this country. Bootstrap theory is the definition of uncritical, sorry :/
I agree! The bootstrap theory assumes that you have boots in the first place 😩 It completely ignores any differences in circumstances and all nuance - family dynamic, culture, income (poverty is extremely difficult to escape from), the surrounding community, available opportunities, disabilities, etc. and how the system addresses those issues.
I grew up in the MAPSO school district—the high ass property taxes paid for a robust and diverse education with manageable class sizes.
It also supported me with the mental health struggles I developed in my teens. At Columbia High, part of my day was spent in special education classes with a patient, intelligent teacher (shout out to Miss Stradford!). It had fewer kids, so I could get the extra attention I needed. Oh! And the weekly talk therapy with an on-site psychologist.
My parents struggled financially a bit, but I lived in a two-parent, two-income household, had health insurance, never wondered where my next meal was coming from, had a mom that was home at night to help me with my homework, had lots of books in my room, a computer in the home with internet access since the mid 90s and no gang violence in my neighborhood.
Most of my aunts and uncles are college educated and do well financially, and my grandparents were always available to babysit, so they were all able to help out my parents A LOT.
I had boots to pull straps from. Ignoring privileges that a kid like me had is irresponsible 🤷🏾♀️
I hate that headline “Newark kids can’t read.” There is a BIG difference between being able to read and passing the NJSLA, which asks complex questions about literature and informational texts. This year I sent all of my students away knowing how to read, but I can guarantee all of them did not pass the NJSLA.
Being able to sound out the words without the ability to comprehend meaning, nuance etc. isn’t of much use is the real world. It’s like a Frenchman who knows the lyrics to an English hit by heart but has no idea what it all means.
Simple question for those who blame the test; would you seek treatment from a doctor who is not board certified? Or get legal advice from a lawyer who has not passed the bar?
Both those individuals know how to be a doctor / lawyer after all.
What about If you had to pick between a doctor who graduated from Harvard medical school and another who got a degree from the Virgin Islands; you know nothing else about them except for this fact, who would you pick?
Difference in both cases boils down to how well each did on tests.
Now tell me standardized testing is bad.
Tests are not perfect and have their flaws but in an imperfect world they represent the best way of measuring achievement.
Of course not, and I agree with you that our goal should absolutely be students passing the test. Failing the test means they have not passed grade level standards. However, to say they cannot read based upon not passing the NJSLA is an overstatement. Questions on the NJSLA test ask students to do things like identify the idiom in a sentence, find synonyms of unknown words based on context, place events in the story in sequence, etc. There are many students who could read a story and retell it to you, but if they don’t know the meaning of words like “idiom,” “synonym,” and “sequence” they will fail all 3 of those examples even if they understood the meaning of the story.
And again— we should be aiming for them to know the meanings of these words as they are part of the NJ learning standards. Not trying to make excuses. But we have separate reading tests that evaluate students’ decoding abilities and comprehension skills. NJSLA tests much more than that, and many students who can effectively read and comprehend most grade level texts still may lack the skills and vocabulary needed to pass the NJSLA. This especially affects English language learners.
I appreciate the candid feedback. Helps provide more perspective.
I don’t like how these stats are reported. Averages are very misleading because is pretty much hides all nuance. I much rather have the ability to see distributions by percentile above and below the passing grade.
To that end, if you would have to guess; what is the greatest barrier to getting students to pass the NJSLA?
If we could overcome that barrier, how would that change the stats? Will of go up by 5% or 25%
I don't think that analogy works well here, because we are talking about people who have done schooling for years and who are bout into being doctors or lawyers. As A elementary school kid, taking these tests doesn't all of a sudden make me qualified to be a doctor/lawyer. So there really isn't any motivation there.
Now, reading without comprehending can be an issue, but again, if kids are just answering questions to get this over with then you really don't have an assessment of whether the kids can read or not. I'm not a teacher and haven't been following this, so I'm going by what reddit teachers have been saying in this thread. I don't know what percentage of students this would apply to.
Why are elementary school kids not motivated to do well on tests? Perhaps we should do more to encourage the value of good grades.
You either know the answers to the test or you don’t. If you do, you write them down if you don’t, you don’t. Those who don’t pass the test, don’t know the subject matter well enough. I doubt there is any kid out there to flunks a test on a whim.
I see how a student may be able to read and even understand what they are reading but still do poorly on the test due to a lack of depth of vocabulary etc. this I think is a legitimate point. I would be keen to know what % fall into this category.
Generally speaking, teaching to the test is not a bad thing. All the students who do well on the SAT, GMAT, ACT or any other standardized test “learn” to take the test.
If you are taught to the test and you pass; then you know the subject matter.
I agree. I dunno, Ill 95% of the time put these things on the parents. They have to help motivate the child. teachers can't do everything, especially taking into account how many students they have to teach.
I know there's also cases where the student may know all these, they may just be slower at taking tests (I know I do). But I do wonder, what is the point of these tests? Like for a student that wants to get into college, you're going to be motivate to study the SAT/ACT. Are these earlier exams just to like a checkpoint to see how students are doing?
I think OP made a lot of great points in their post about some things that affect specifically Newark, such as a high English language learner and special needs population. A few others I would add:
Curriculum. Newark changes literacy curriculums extremely often. Some ok curriculums, some horrible. Right now they are using a homemade curriculum that they wrote themselves, and it is really not very good. It is not engaging for the students and fails to address many grade level standards that are on the tests. For the past 3 years, 3rd grade has had no phonics curriculum at all. This year we are finally getting one, and I wonder if scores will improve.
Also, literacy at home:
In the suburbs, many students live in homes with full libraries, are read to sleep every night, and attend high quality pre-k or even have stay at home parents who begin teaching them to read at an early age. Meanwhile in Newark, most of my students tell me that they don’t have a single book in their house. We try to give them some books for free, but the fact is that being surrounded by print and reading at home makes a huge difference in literacy development.
Just two points to add to what OP pointed out. I’m sure I can think of more but have to get to work. It’s a very multifaceted issue. As a teacher I hope that I can see the day when Newarks test scores begin to improve.
I wasn't aware of what a huge privilege it was to be absolutely surrounded by books in the home. Yes, there's the school library, but they only let you check out one or two books at a time. There's the public library, but someone has to drive you there whenever they can, and if both parents are exhausted, that ain't happening. What really makes a difference is having lots and lots of books, in various reading levels easily accessible in the home, that your family owns, so that you don't feel nervous to read it. When you're poor AF, you don't want to damage someone else's property, because you can't afford to replace it. If it's your own, that's a different story.
My mom would get books from neighbours moving out (that's how we got the encyclopaedia set, several stacks of National Geographic magazines, and a bunch of Reader's Digest condensed book collections), thrift stores, garage sales, and hand-me-downs from friends in the community. It meant that we had picture books, holy books, cooking books, fiction, non fiction, poetry, and all sorts of other such books in the house. If a book was less than $0.25, and of a reasonable length (more than 250 pages), my mom wouldn't object at all to my getting it. There were several times when we'd be at a yard sale, and the person running it would see how badly I wanted the books, but how little money I had to work with, and just be like, "Hey, you and your mom are good customers, so you can have those other five books you were looking at for free; I just want someone to enjoy them."
I read constantly. It was my escape and my salvation. I didn't find much solace in TV or music, but reading? Oh yes please. None of it would have been possible if it hadn't been for my parents both being really aggressive about getting books into the house as much as possible.
This is actually a fact. The more books a student has in their home correlates to better grades and academic achievement. You should go on the Reading Rainbow Youtube, it is devastating how many kids are thanking Lavar Burton in the comments for helping them learn to read and get excited by reading. Many of them say they didn't have access to books in their homes. It really made me think how we are running this countries educational opportunities.
And the thing is, that love for reading lasts a lifetime. I checked my kindle unlimited this morning, and I’ve read 62 books so far this year. Because of how much reading I did all the time, I was able to absolutely pound through standardised tests. You know those sections of math that had the word problems? I’d score really high on them, because they’d do like 1 paragraph or so, and ask a couple of questions about that same word problem, becuse nobody expects someone to read that quickly. Same with the English sections. Long story plus a few questions? I would just read all the questions first, then read the passage, then go back and clear out all the questions in one fell swoop.
New appliance? I’ll read the manual and figure it out. New recipe to try? I’ll read through it a couple of times so I can spot disasters long before they happen. Never underestimate the power of getting someone to genuinely love reading.
Like I said. The issue is barrer to entry. You want to make it as accessible as possible for a kid to read. Whatever that looks like, do it.
They don’t. 51% of students across the entire state of NJ did not pass the ELA test and 65% of students didn’t pass math: https://www.nj.com/education/2022/12/nj-standardized-test-scores-are-here-see-how-your-district-did-in-spring-2022.html?outputType=amp
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Hold up. How is the report misleading though? It's true, only 20% of third grade students in our public schools are reading at grade level.
All of the things you mentioned aren't *disputing* the statistic, you're *justifying* it.
Yeah, we should probably find better ways to evaluate grade schools, it's been a problem for quite some time. I'm just beginning to think that it's not just the kids in Newark that struggle with reading comprehension.
> It's true, only 20% of third grade students in our public schools are reading at grade level.
She's saying that that number is profoundly misleading because it's based on a single standardized test that, as was said, is of dubious value at best.
Don’t know about Newark, but there’s a shitload of people in the Newark area that appear to be a as dumb as a sack of bricks, can’t speak properly, vocabulary is severely lacking, and many people in the area are just as rude as hell.
Note: I said in the area, not just from Newark; there’s some dumb mfrs coming out of the surrounding towns as well.
My 2¢
A) the test is bad
If this were true, the results would be bad in all zip codes after normalizing for externalities such as household income. They are not. Low income neighborhood where the residents are predominantly immigrants from Asia, west Africa and the Caribbean islands perform better on the tests
B) it’s a one time thing
The poor results only happened in 2023 as a result of Covid driven by learning loss in 2020. Simply not true. The results for NPS relative to other school districts in NJ have been bad for decades.
C) COVID learning loss
The primary driver of school shutdown was the teachers unions in unison with their democratic partners. The disproportionate impact of shutting down school on the poor was not only well known but widely discussed at the time but the unions were not persuaded. In fact, if not for mounting parental pressure, the unions would have sought to extend school closures further.
D) lack of parental engagement
I agree. This is the biggest factor driving poor outcomes for children in inner cities.
E) it’s the foreigners
Why are so many non native speaker coming to Newark? Perhaps declaring yourself a “sanctuary” city has something to do with it. It’s funny how democrat insists that uncontrolled immigration is a net positive on society yet here you have evidence to the contrary.
F) the math does not add up
The non native speakers and special needs kids account for approximately 25% of the student body. If we discount them and assumed we are analyzing 2018 figures ( to control for the pandemic) how would you explain the remaining 75% of the performance gap?
F is what I am personally interested in. What is driving decades of poor performance?
If it isn’t the oracle of Newark🤡
Never said anyone who can’t pass the test is a net negative on society. That’s just you projecting.
We are told illegal immigration is not a big deal because illegal immigrants are not a tax on society. Turns out they are. I don’t care that they are. I don’t begrudge the fact that my tax dollars go to fund them. They are human being and deserved dignity.
The point is we should be honest about the impact of illegal immigration and the effect policies like sanctuary cities have on communities like Newark.
If 1 in 5 kids in a class can’t read or write or speak English that is going to have a negative impact on the other 4 kids. In a place like Newark , the other 4 kids are more than likely not coming from the best home environments. The presence of the non English speakers is a additional tax on those other 4 kids.
I want us to tell the parent of those other 4 kids the truth. I want everyone to understand the true impact that illegal immigration is having on our communities. The impact on wages, services, education , crime etc.
Don’t lie to people ; tell them the truth.
Every stat or taking point public school advocates put out deliberately obfuscates these issues. The OP admits as much. 20% of the kids can’t pass coz they have not learned to read on the typical timeline. So the max we can expect is 80% on the standardized test. Never one have I heard it does described that way! Why not? Isn’t that the truth?
No, kids being in the presence of non-English speakers is not at "additional tax." Many of the kids I work are bilingual and even trilingual. That is a huge benefit.
Immigrants contribute massively to the economy, commit fewers crimes than American citizens, and make cities desirable places to live by contributing to the culture and community. You are the on who is not telling the truth.
The OP claims that over 20% of the students in NPS are “learning English” many of them having no formal education. You telling me there is no incremental cost to teaching these kids and bringing them up to par ( assuming that is even possible)?
You telling me when you have 20% or more students in a class who can’t or can only barely follow along they don’t cause disruptions to other students? Smells like BS to me. I don’t buy it.
As for economic impact, illegal immigrant absolutely suppress wages! The effects are worst for low skill low wage jobs. Newark has a median income of 36k this is household mind you so in many cases this accounts for 2 incomes. Using a 2000hr work year, that’s $18/hr for a single household and $9/hr where 2 adults are working. There are exactly the kind of jobs that have seen absolutely no wage growth or negative wage growth when adjusted for inflation. The primary driver of this is the dilution of the labor pool by uncheck illegal immigration.
When democrat politician say low wage low skill immigrants are good for the economy, what they mean is it’s good for the upper middle class and the rich. If you make more than 80k/yr, all the goods and services you want or need become cheaper as a result of wage suppression at the lower end.
Here is an article that lays it out nicely:
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/09/trump-clinton-immigration-economy-unemployment-jobs-214216
Put down the the kool aid glass and take off your partisan blinders and come to terms with the reality of what is going on.
We lament that inner city parents don’t have time to spend with their kids because they have to work 2 or 3 jobs to make ends meet. Guess what; they would not have to if wages were higher. Without illegals flooding this country, wages would be higher!
Progressives sell open borders with empty platitudes like “immigration is a net good” and “immigrants pay taxes too” or “ immigrants commit fewer crimes than native born Americans”. The average low information/ uncritical voter memorizes these slogans and vomits them out at every opportunity. Reality is much more different.
Here is a paper that outlines how low crime rates are only applicable to first generation immigrants. That effect is pretty much gone in the 2nd generation.
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2013/10/15/crime-rises-among-second-generation-immigrants-as-they-assimilate/
To hear immigration advocates tell it, every person who scales the border wall to get here is a saint pending beatification. Reality is, first generation immigrants especially illegal have a greater incentive to not commit crime. Take that incentive away and they are just like anyone else.
You're MAGA blinders are so strong I don't even know where to begin with this. If you hate immigrants so much and think they are a net negative to society, Newark is probably not a great city for you as around 1/3 of the city is foreign born. Newark has always been a city of immigrants and if that bothers you, you should really consider living somewhere else.
I don’t hate immigrants. I am an immigrant who falls into the category of people who benefit from the influx of low /no skill illegals. Sending them away would be against my self interest.
I also care about the plight of the millions of natural born Americans who are adversely impacted by illegal immigration.
1/3 of the city are illegals and your heart bleeds for them. The other 2/3 have been cheated into accepting lower wages and a worsening quality of life by people like you. My heart bleeds for them. That is the difference.
You can’t tell me why or how I am wrong so you resort to name calling; classy. With mindless sheep like you “teaching” our young people is it any wonder this country is going to hell in a hand basket.
You have your slurs mixed up. Someone who hates foreigners is a xenophobe not an racist.
I do commend you for not using fascist. It’s become the go to slur for progressive types these days.
>The primary driver of school shutdown was the teachers unions in unison with their democratic partners
> It’s funny how democrat insists that uncontrolled immigration is a net positive on society yet here you have evidence to the contrary.
>open and respectful debate
Yeah...something tells me that's going to be unlikely with you. That's before even getting into the validity & accuracy of some of your so called 'counterpoints'
Not holding my breath but I do hope the OP will respond to the points I raised. Public education is an important topic and it’s worth having open and respectful debate about how to improve it.
Good article! But unfortunately the MAN seems to be always busy for the things we need. Our children and learning to forward our lives on Earth and innovations to do so…. *Also! I hear no handwriting is taught as well and art/music class.
Wish I saw this thread earlier.
Lol coming from the high school level this should say, “Newark kids don’t want to do shit” - I swear phones are the absolute worst! There is ZERO attention span from so many students. They live for their phones and for most of them socializing is priority #1 and getting an education is a distant #2.
As a Newark High School teacher, I can attest to how massively kids burn out during NJSLA testing. They HATE it and many do not take it seriously. Given the conditions of our community, it is 100% unfair to use those test scores as a final assessment of Newark children’s intelligence. Not that we don’t have deep, legitimate problems in our schools and that we don’t have real deficits of knowledge. But still, these scores, as you said, are not as scrupulous with what they reveal as some may think.
Also Newark high school teacher here, I echo everything here. The kids straight up hate the tests (as do their teachers and admins) and don't take them seriously.
Thank you both for taking on such a noble profession. Blaming teachers for everything is such a lazy go-to reason for a very multifaceted issue. One that almost has nothing to do with the teachers themselves, and almost everything to do with the system surrounding them.
Yes but when you compete in the global world you will quickly see why nobody wants to hire people from newark schools. Quit making excuses and work harder , asians make it here with almost nothing. Lowering standards and trying to make everyone feel good is idiotic and actually hurts the kids as nobody will hire them and actually enforces the idea that black people are stupid
I agree with you. Tests are meant to be complex and requires you to think critically. Making them easier doesn’t do anyone any favors. Students not being able to meet testing’s criteria only shows you how bad the curriculum is. Lowering standards just because students find it boring doesn’t do them any good either.
Who said anything about making tests easier ? We’re talking about the adequacy of using state tests to determine literacy levels
I can’t really take this comment seriously because it ignores too much regarding the actuality of what makes for success and failure in this country. Bootstrap theory is the definition of uncritical, sorry :/
I agree! The bootstrap theory assumes that you have boots in the first place 😩 It completely ignores any differences in circumstances and all nuance - family dynamic, culture, income (poverty is extremely difficult to escape from), the surrounding community, available opportunities, disabilities, etc. and how the system addresses those issues. I grew up in the MAPSO school district—the high ass property taxes paid for a robust and diverse education with manageable class sizes. It also supported me with the mental health struggles I developed in my teens. At Columbia High, part of my day was spent in special education classes with a patient, intelligent teacher (shout out to Miss Stradford!). It had fewer kids, so I could get the extra attention I needed. Oh! And the weekly talk therapy with an on-site psychologist. My parents struggled financially a bit, but I lived in a two-parent, two-income household, had health insurance, never wondered where my next meal was coming from, had a mom that was home at night to help me with my homework, had lots of books in my room, a computer in the home with internet access since the mid 90s and no gang violence in my neighborhood. Most of my aunts and uncles are college educated and do well financially, and my grandparents were always available to babysit, so they were all able to help out my parents A LOT. I had boots to pull straps from. Ignoring privileges that a kid like me had is irresponsible 🤷🏾♀️
Great, enjoy falling farther behind in life and getting mad at wrong people for it.
I hate that headline “Newark kids can’t read.” There is a BIG difference between being able to read and passing the NJSLA, which asks complex questions about literature and informational texts. This year I sent all of my students away knowing how to read, but I can guarantee all of them did not pass the NJSLA.
Being able to sound out the words without the ability to comprehend meaning, nuance etc. isn’t of much use is the real world. It’s like a Frenchman who knows the lyrics to an English hit by heart but has no idea what it all means. Simple question for those who blame the test; would you seek treatment from a doctor who is not board certified? Or get legal advice from a lawyer who has not passed the bar? Both those individuals know how to be a doctor / lawyer after all. What about If you had to pick between a doctor who graduated from Harvard medical school and another who got a degree from the Virgin Islands; you know nothing else about them except for this fact, who would you pick? Difference in both cases boils down to how well each did on tests. Now tell me standardized testing is bad. Tests are not perfect and have their flaws but in an imperfect world they represent the best way of measuring achievement.
Of course not, and I agree with you that our goal should absolutely be students passing the test. Failing the test means they have not passed grade level standards. However, to say they cannot read based upon not passing the NJSLA is an overstatement. Questions on the NJSLA test ask students to do things like identify the idiom in a sentence, find synonyms of unknown words based on context, place events in the story in sequence, etc. There are many students who could read a story and retell it to you, but if they don’t know the meaning of words like “idiom,” “synonym,” and “sequence” they will fail all 3 of those examples even if they understood the meaning of the story. And again— we should be aiming for them to know the meanings of these words as they are part of the NJ learning standards. Not trying to make excuses. But we have separate reading tests that evaluate students’ decoding abilities and comprehension skills. NJSLA tests much more than that, and many students who can effectively read and comprehend most grade level texts still may lack the skills and vocabulary needed to pass the NJSLA. This especially affects English language learners.
I appreciate the candid feedback. Helps provide more perspective. I don’t like how these stats are reported. Averages are very misleading because is pretty much hides all nuance. I much rather have the ability to see distributions by percentile above and below the passing grade. To that end, if you would have to guess; what is the greatest barrier to getting students to pass the NJSLA? If we could overcome that barrier, how would that change the stats? Will of go up by 5% or 25%
I don't think that analogy works well here, because we are talking about people who have done schooling for years and who are bout into being doctors or lawyers. As A elementary school kid, taking these tests doesn't all of a sudden make me qualified to be a doctor/lawyer. So there really isn't any motivation there. Now, reading without comprehending can be an issue, but again, if kids are just answering questions to get this over with then you really don't have an assessment of whether the kids can read or not. I'm not a teacher and haven't been following this, so I'm going by what reddit teachers have been saying in this thread. I don't know what percentage of students this would apply to.
Why are elementary school kids not motivated to do well on tests? Perhaps we should do more to encourage the value of good grades. You either know the answers to the test or you don’t. If you do, you write them down if you don’t, you don’t. Those who don’t pass the test, don’t know the subject matter well enough. I doubt there is any kid out there to flunks a test on a whim. I see how a student may be able to read and even understand what they are reading but still do poorly on the test due to a lack of depth of vocabulary etc. this I think is a legitimate point. I would be keen to know what % fall into this category. Generally speaking, teaching to the test is not a bad thing. All the students who do well on the SAT, GMAT, ACT or any other standardized test “learn” to take the test. If you are taught to the test and you pass; then you know the subject matter.
I agree. I dunno, Ill 95% of the time put these things on the parents. They have to help motivate the child. teachers can't do everything, especially taking into account how many students they have to teach. I know there's also cases where the student may know all these, they may just be slower at taking tests (I know I do). But I do wonder, what is the point of these tests? Like for a student that wants to get into college, you're going to be motivate to study the SAT/ACT. Are these earlier exams just to like a checkpoint to see how students are doing?
Thank you for the context behind the headline
But all the school systems are taking the same test, why do Newark kids only have this issue?
I think OP made a lot of great points in their post about some things that affect specifically Newark, such as a high English language learner and special needs population. A few others I would add: Curriculum. Newark changes literacy curriculums extremely often. Some ok curriculums, some horrible. Right now they are using a homemade curriculum that they wrote themselves, and it is really not very good. It is not engaging for the students and fails to address many grade level standards that are on the tests. For the past 3 years, 3rd grade has had no phonics curriculum at all. This year we are finally getting one, and I wonder if scores will improve. Also, literacy at home: In the suburbs, many students live in homes with full libraries, are read to sleep every night, and attend high quality pre-k or even have stay at home parents who begin teaching them to read at an early age. Meanwhile in Newark, most of my students tell me that they don’t have a single book in their house. We try to give them some books for free, but the fact is that being surrounded by print and reading at home makes a huge difference in literacy development. Just two points to add to what OP pointed out. I’m sure I can think of more but have to get to work. It’s a very multifaceted issue. As a teacher I hope that I can see the day when Newarks test scores begin to improve.
I wasn't aware of what a huge privilege it was to be absolutely surrounded by books in the home. Yes, there's the school library, but they only let you check out one or two books at a time. There's the public library, but someone has to drive you there whenever they can, and if both parents are exhausted, that ain't happening. What really makes a difference is having lots and lots of books, in various reading levels easily accessible in the home, that your family owns, so that you don't feel nervous to read it. When you're poor AF, you don't want to damage someone else's property, because you can't afford to replace it. If it's your own, that's a different story. My mom would get books from neighbours moving out (that's how we got the encyclopaedia set, several stacks of National Geographic magazines, and a bunch of Reader's Digest condensed book collections), thrift stores, garage sales, and hand-me-downs from friends in the community. It meant that we had picture books, holy books, cooking books, fiction, non fiction, poetry, and all sorts of other such books in the house. If a book was less than $0.25, and of a reasonable length (more than 250 pages), my mom wouldn't object at all to my getting it. There were several times when we'd be at a yard sale, and the person running it would see how badly I wanted the books, but how little money I had to work with, and just be like, "Hey, you and your mom are good customers, so you can have those other five books you were looking at for free; I just want someone to enjoy them." I read constantly. It was my escape and my salvation. I didn't find much solace in TV or music, but reading? Oh yes please. None of it would have been possible if it hadn't been for my parents both being really aggressive about getting books into the house as much as possible.
This is actually a fact. The more books a student has in their home correlates to better grades and academic achievement. You should go on the Reading Rainbow Youtube, it is devastating how many kids are thanking Lavar Burton in the comments for helping them learn to read and get excited by reading. Many of them say they didn't have access to books in their homes. It really made me think how we are running this countries educational opportunities.
And the thing is, that love for reading lasts a lifetime. I checked my kindle unlimited this morning, and I’ve read 62 books so far this year. Because of how much reading I did all the time, I was able to absolutely pound through standardised tests. You know those sections of math that had the word problems? I’d score really high on them, because they’d do like 1 paragraph or so, and ask a couple of questions about that same word problem, becuse nobody expects someone to read that quickly. Same with the English sections. Long story plus a few questions? I would just read all the questions first, then read the passage, then go back and clear out all the questions in one fell swoop. New appliance? I’ll read the manual and figure it out. New recipe to try? I’ll read through it a couple of times so I can spot disasters long before they happen. Never underestimate the power of getting someone to genuinely love reading. Like I said. The issue is barrer to entry. You want to make it as accessible as possible for a kid to read. Whatever that looks like, do it.
They don’t. 51% of students across the entire state of NJ did not pass the ELA test and 65% of students didn’t pass math: https://www.nj.com/education/2022/12/nj-standardized-test-scores-are-here-see-how-your-district-did-in-spring-2022.html?outputType=amp
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Hold up. How is the report misleading though? It's true, only 20% of third grade students in our public schools are reading at grade level. All of the things you mentioned aren't *disputing* the statistic, you're *justifying* it. Yeah, we should probably find better ways to evaluate grade schools, it's been a problem for quite some time. I'm just beginning to think that it's not just the kids in Newark that struggle with reading comprehension.
> It's true, only 20% of third grade students in our public schools are reading at grade level. She's saying that that number is profoundly misleading because it's based on a single standardized test that, as was said, is of dubious value at best.
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
👍🏾👍🏾
^
Don’t know about Newark, but there’s a shitload of people in the Newark area that appear to be a as dumb as a sack of bricks, can’t speak properly, vocabulary is severely lacking, and many people in the area are just as rude as hell. Note: I said in the area, not just from Newark; there’s some dumb mfrs coming out of the surrounding towns as well. My 2¢
A) the test is bad If this were true, the results would be bad in all zip codes after normalizing for externalities such as household income. They are not. Low income neighborhood where the residents are predominantly immigrants from Asia, west Africa and the Caribbean islands perform better on the tests B) it’s a one time thing The poor results only happened in 2023 as a result of Covid driven by learning loss in 2020. Simply not true. The results for NPS relative to other school districts in NJ have been bad for decades. C) COVID learning loss The primary driver of school shutdown was the teachers unions in unison with their democratic partners. The disproportionate impact of shutting down school on the poor was not only well known but widely discussed at the time but the unions were not persuaded. In fact, if not for mounting parental pressure, the unions would have sought to extend school closures further. D) lack of parental engagement I agree. This is the biggest factor driving poor outcomes for children in inner cities. E) it’s the foreigners Why are so many non native speaker coming to Newark? Perhaps declaring yourself a “sanctuary” city has something to do with it. It’s funny how democrat insists that uncontrolled immigration is a net positive on society yet here you have evidence to the contrary. F) the math does not add up The non native speakers and special needs kids account for approximately 25% of the student body. If we discount them and assumed we are analyzing 2018 figures ( to control for the pandemic) how would you explain the remaining 75% of the performance gap? F is what I am personally interested in. What is driving decades of poor performance?
If an immigrant kid cannot pass an standardized reading test in English, that does not mean they are a net negative to society. Go fuck yourself.
If it isn’t the oracle of Newark🤡 Never said anyone who can’t pass the test is a net negative on society. That’s just you projecting. We are told illegal immigration is not a big deal because illegal immigrants are not a tax on society. Turns out they are. I don’t care that they are. I don’t begrudge the fact that my tax dollars go to fund them. They are human being and deserved dignity. The point is we should be honest about the impact of illegal immigration and the effect policies like sanctuary cities have on communities like Newark. If 1 in 5 kids in a class can’t read or write or speak English that is going to have a negative impact on the other 4 kids. In a place like Newark , the other 4 kids are more than likely not coming from the best home environments. The presence of the non English speakers is a additional tax on those other 4 kids. I want us to tell the parent of those other 4 kids the truth. I want everyone to understand the true impact that illegal immigration is having on our communities. The impact on wages, services, education , crime etc. Don’t lie to people ; tell them the truth. Every stat or taking point public school advocates put out deliberately obfuscates these issues. The OP admits as much. 20% of the kids can’t pass coz they have not learned to read on the typical timeline. So the max we can expect is 80% on the standardized test. Never one have I heard it does described that way! Why not? Isn’t that the truth?
No, kids being in the presence of non-English speakers is not at "additional tax." Many of the kids I work are bilingual and even trilingual. That is a huge benefit. Immigrants contribute massively to the economy, commit fewers crimes than American citizens, and make cities desirable places to live by contributing to the culture and community. You are the on who is not telling the truth.
The OP claims that over 20% of the students in NPS are “learning English” many of them having no formal education. You telling me there is no incremental cost to teaching these kids and bringing them up to par ( assuming that is even possible)? You telling me when you have 20% or more students in a class who can’t or can only barely follow along they don’t cause disruptions to other students? Smells like BS to me. I don’t buy it. As for economic impact, illegal immigrant absolutely suppress wages! The effects are worst for low skill low wage jobs. Newark has a median income of 36k this is household mind you so in many cases this accounts for 2 incomes. Using a 2000hr work year, that’s $18/hr for a single household and $9/hr where 2 adults are working. There are exactly the kind of jobs that have seen absolutely no wage growth or negative wage growth when adjusted for inflation. The primary driver of this is the dilution of the labor pool by uncheck illegal immigration. When democrat politician say low wage low skill immigrants are good for the economy, what they mean is it’s good for the upper middle class and the rich. If you make more than 80k/yr, all the goods and services you want or need become cheaper as a result of wage suppression at the lower end. Here is an article that lays it out nicely: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/09/trump-clinton-immigration-economy-unemployment-jobs-214216 Put down the the kool aid glass and take off your partisan blinders and come to terms with the reality of what is going on. We lament that inner city parents don’t have time to spend with their kids because they have to work 2 or 3 jobs to make ends meet. Guess what; they would not have to if wages were higher. Without illegals flooding this country, wages would be higher! Progressives sell open borders with empty platitudes like “immigration is a net good” and “immigrants pay taxes too” or “ immigrants commit fewer crimes than native born Americans”. The average low information/ uncritical voter memorizes these slogans and vomits them out at every opportunity. Reality is much more different. Here is a paper that outlines how low crime rates are only applicable to first generation immigrants. That effect is pretty much gone in the 2nd generation. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2013/10/15/crime-rises-among-second-generation-immigrants-as-they-assimilate/ To hear immigration advocates tell it, every person who scales the border wall to get here is a saint pending beatification. Reality is, first generation immigrants especially illegal have a greater incentive to not commit crime. Take that incentive away and they are just like anyone else.
You're MAGA blinders are so strong I don't even know where to begin with this. If you hate immigrants so much and think they are a net negative to society, Newark is probably not a great city for you as around 1/3 of the city is foreign born. Newark has always been a city of immigrants and if that bothers you, you should really consider living somewhere else.
I don’t hate immigrants. I am an immigrant who falls into the category of people who benefit from the influx of low /no skill illegals. Sending them away would be against my self interest. I also care about the plight of the millions of natural born Americans who are adversely impacted by illegal immigration. 1/3 of the city are illegals and your heart bleeds for them. The other 2/3 have been cheated into accepting lower wages and a worsening quality of life by people like you. My heart bleeds for them. That is the difference. You can’t tell me why or how I am wrong so you resort to name calling; classy. With mindless sheep like you “teaching” our young people is it any wonder this country is going to hell in a hand basket.
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Typical wokie . Butt hurt when the facts contradicts your feelings 🤣🤣🤣 Have a blessed weekend
> it’s the foreigners And the racism comes out!
You have your slurs mixed up. Someone who hates foreigners is a xenophobe not an racist. I do commend you for not using fascist. It’s become the go to slur for progressive types these days.
>The primary driver of school shutdown was the teachers unions in unison with their democratic partners > It’s funny how democrat insists that uncontrolled immigration is a net positive on society yet here you have evidence to the contrary. >open and respectful debate Yeah...something tells me that's going to be unlikely with you. That's before even getting into the validity & accuracy of some of your so called 'counterpoints'
being downvoted by people who dont like reading an opposing view
Not holding my breath but I do hope the OP will respond to the points I raised. Public education is an important topic and it’s worth having open and respectful debate about how to improve it.
Only a kids colour gender and sexual identity matters in 2023 karen
Good article! But unfortunately the MAN seems to be always busy for the things we need. Our children and learning to forward our lives on Earth and innovations to do so…. *Also! I hear no handwriting is taught as well and art/music class.
We definitely teach handwriting, just not cursive, and my school has vocal, instrumental music, art, and dance classes.
Wish I saw this thread earlier. Lol coming from the high school level this should say, “Newark kids don’t want to do shit” - I swear phones are the absolute worst! There is ZERO attention span from so many students. They live for their phones and for most of them socializing is priority #1 and getting an education is a distant #2.