Cracking the Code of Inner City School Troubles
Did you know that ninety three percent of Missouri schools are performing adequately or above expectations? It may be surprising to some that that number is so high. You would think, with all we are changing in our public education, that the number would be much lower, say around twenty five percent. But the fact is, we have been trying to "fix" the seven percent that aren't doing so well, and those seven percent are, by and large, in our urban areas in St. Louis and Kansas City. Just look where the schools have lost accreditation and you will see what areas we are trying hardest to fix. Both those cities could exist in any state. The inner city school seems to be ground zero for academic failure and many in the education intelligentsia have proffered their reforms to change the student scores in those schools. Because we no longer believe in targeted strategies, but have preferred to aim for education equity, we find ourselves in teh situation we are in today where we are changing what schools do everywhere to fix the problem in our inner cities.
John Kuhn, in a stunning frank but well written article, explains why most of the reform efforts aimed at inner