In yesterday’s Star Ledger, columnist Tom Moran excoriates Gov. Christie for not reappointing Justice John Wallace to the NJ Supreme Court. In defense of Justice Wallace and his colleagues, he itemizes a series of decisions that have been fair, including the Abbott school funding decisions:
Take school funding. Most of the anger aimed at the court belongs at the feet of the legislators and governors who have monstrously failed to make the most of our education dollars. The court did not demand excessive salaries, or overweight bureaucracies, or swimming pools. Nor did it block innovations like merit pay for teachers.
It’s true. The Court is not to blame for subsequent government corruption. But Moran’s next claim is baffling:
What the court demanded was equal rights for poor kids. And despite the stumbles, New Jersey is closing the racial achievement gap faster than any other state.
Mr. Moran should have looked more closely at the data from the test scores he’s referring to, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), also known as The Nation’s Report Card. We’ll do it for him.
Samples of students are tested through NAEP at 4th and 8th grades. Results are tabulated by race, gender, and whether or not a child is eligible for free/reduced lunch (the barometer for poverty). While there’s some upward movement in the achievement gap between races in NJ, our achievement gap between impoverished and non-impoverished students remains intractable. For example, in 1992 fourth grade Black students in NJ scored 35 points below White students in the reading test, in 2009 that gap was only 25 points. However, according to the NAEP discussion, “In 2009, students who were eligible for free/reduced-price school lunch, an indicator of low income, had an average score that was 26 points lower than that of students who were not eligible for free/reduced-price school lunch. This performance gap was not significantly different from that in 2003.” Fourth grade math shows similar results: lower gaps by race, but not by indicators of poverty: 1996 results were “not statistically different” (32 point spread) than 2009 (26 point spread).
For eighth graders, reading scores show similar trends between Black and White students. However, the achievement gap for Hispanic students and impoverished students remains solid. From the NAEP narrative:
In 2009, Hispanic students had an average score that was 25 points lower than that of White students. This performance gap was not significantly different from that in 2003 (28 points). .In 2009, students who were eligible for free/reduced-price school lunch, an indicator of low income, had an average score that was 27 points lower than that of students who were not eligible for free/reduced-price school lunch. This performance gap was not significantly different from that in 2003 (30 points).
8th grade math paints a grimmer picture. The achievement gap between White and Black students in 2009 (34 points) “was not statistically different than that in 1990” (38 points). Hispanic children in 2009 “had an average score that was 30 points lower than that of White students. This performance gap was not significantly different than that in 1990 (37 points).” And for 8th graders eligible for free/reduced lunch, the gap was 30 points lower in 2009, “not significantly different than that in 2003 (34 points).”
Is New Jersey closing the achievement gap? You decide.
