Anatomy of a 6,000-hour deficit
As we recently reported, by the time a child from a low-income family reaches sixth grade, he or she has spent an estimated 6,000 fewer hours learning than a peer from a wealthy household.
How did researchers come up with 6,000 hours? At a Halloween morning conference at the Ford Foundation (one of our funders at The Hechinger Report), we got a breakdown of the math, courtesy of The After-School Corporation, or TASC. It goes like this:
– 220 fewer hours being read to by family members
– 1,395 hours not spent in pre-kindergarten, which poor children access at much lower rates
– 3,060 fewer hours doing after-school and extracurricular activities in elementary school
– 1,080 fewer hours in camp and other summer programs
– 245 fewer hours visiting zoos, museums and the like
So what to do? Early intervention as prevention is key, obviously, but what about all the low-income students who have already made it to sixth grade and beyond? Either they need more time in school