National

Closing Achievement Gaps Requires More than Education Reform

Published

11 years ago

June 16, 2015

By Freddie Allen
NNPA Senior Washington Correspondent

WASHINGTON (NNPA) – Education reform alone isn’t enough to close achievement gaps between Blacks and Whites, according to a new report by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).

The study by EPI, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank focused on the needs of low- and middle-income families, analyzed how key social and class factors work to diminish student achievement. Those characteristics include parenting practices, single parenthood, irregular work schedules, lack of access to primary and preventive health care and lead exposure.

Leila Morsy, a lecturer from the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, said that even though politicians understand that family and community characteristics affect student performance, they don’t understand how to address its impact.

“Though not all lower-social-class families have each of these characteristics, all have many of them,” Morsy said in a statement. “Pushing policies that address these social class characteristics might be a more powerful way to raise the achievement of disadvantaged children than school improvement strategies.”

Educators should still be encouraged to support strategies such as improving access to early childhood care and education, school-based health centers and after-school and summer opportunities, the report suggested, but those programs must be pursued in conjunction with “macroeconomic policies like full employment, higher wages, and stable work schedules,” that also help to nurture children.

Parental engagement and an educational home environment are critical to fostering student achievement.

According to the Education Department’s Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (Kindergarten Class of 2010–2011), Black parents reported an average of 44 books in the home, less than half the number given by White parents (112). Black parents also spend about 40 percent less time reading to their young children compared to Whites and Black mothers are “two-thirds as likely as White mothers to read to toddlers daily,” according to the EPI report.

Parental engagement and home environment can be life-changing in those preschool years and research shows that poor families, independent of race, can take steps to make sure that their children don’t lose ground to their financially-stable peers.

“Low-income parents of children in Head Start who spend more time reading to their children, visit the library more often, keep more children’s books in the home, and begin reading to their children at an earlier age have children with higher literacy skills,” the report said. “These children are more ready to read when they reach school age, have better vocabularies, are better able to identify words and letters, and know more story and print concepts – the title of a book, the author, reading from left to right, understanding characters’ feelings.”

More than half of Black children under the age of 18 live in homes with absent fathers, compared to just 18 percent of White children.

The report said that single parents are more stressed and that single mothers who suffer from depression at higher rates are “more likely to abuse children, causing worse outcomes for children themselves.”

That stress is compounded when parents have irregular or nighttime work schedules.

“For example, for low-income African American mothers of preschool children, each additional nighttime hour of work is associated with a decrease in cognitively stimulating mother–child activities,” the report said.

Even though most poor children can get health care through Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), they still face hurdles accessing primary and preventive care. Doctors are also in short supply in low-income communities. That means poor children, especially poor Black children, have to wait longer to get treated for common illnesses, including allergies, asthma and dental problems.

Despite strides to eliminate lead in gasoline and in paint for about 40 years, Blacks are still twice as likely as Whites to have dangerous levels of the metal in their blood.

“Even very low levels of lead contribute to cognitive impairment, including reductions in IQ and verbal and reading ability, with no identifiable safe bottom threshold,” the report stated. “Childhood lead exposure also appears to be closely linked to young adult criminal behavior. Crime rates fell more rapidly in states where leaded gasoline was banned more quickly.”

Black children from low-income families absorb more lead from their environment, because they have less calcium in their diets, negatively affecting brain development.

The report noted that discrimination in the criminal justice system leads to higher incarceration rates for young, Black men. Prison convictions make it harder for Black fathers to find gainful employment to support their families, which can also affect the academic success of their children.

“Reforming drug laws, ending imprisonment of non-violent offenders, and curtailing racial profiling in urban policing can result in fewer young African American men disqualified from employment because they report criminal records,” the EPI report suggested.

The report also recommended curbing “just-in-time” work schedules, expanding full-service school-based health centers and protecting children from lead exposure can have a positive impact in the lives of children from low-income families.

Richard Rothstein, a research associate with the Economic Policy Institute and co-author of the report, said that closing the education achievement gap is going to take social reform for low-income families and their children.

“Policymakers should focus on improving the living conditions of these children and their families,” said Rothstein. “That is likely to have a palpable impact on closing the achievement gap.”

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Oakland Post: Week of July 1 – 7, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of July 1 – 7, 2026

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1 day ago

July 5, 2026

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NPRC Joins National Grand Jury Proceedings Seeking Accountability, Constitutional Restoration

Organizers state that testimony will explore historical and political developments that they believe have contributed to the expansion of corporate influence over public institutions and governmental decision-making. Participants are expected to discuss concerns regarding constitutional governance, individual liberties, property rights, and the protection of vulnerable populations, including seniors and persons with disabilities.

Published

1 week ago

June 26, 2026

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Photo by Billie Powers.

Special to The Post

The National Probate Reform Coalition (NPRC) has joined Toll and Roll and a growing coalition of advocacy organizations, victims, whistleblowers, and citizen groups in support of a nationally broadcast People’s Grand Jury proceeding scheduled for July 1 and July 7.

Organizers describe the event as a public forum designed to examine allegations of government abuse, judicial misconduct, legislative failures, and the erosion of constitutional protections affecting millions of Americans.

The proceedings will feature testimony from victims, families, advocates, and organizations from across the country who contend they have experienced harm through government actions, institutional neglect, and failures of oversight.

According to organizers, the People’s Grand Jury will focus on concerns involving probate courts, guardianships, conservatorships, child welfare systems, property rights, civil liberties, and what participants view as a growing disconnect between government institutions and the constitutional rights of the people they are sworn to serve.

NPRC is participating because many of the issues being examined mirror the concerns raised by advocates, victims, and families who have participated in its monthly town halls. For years, families have reported cases involving exploitation of elders, questionable guardianships, estate depletion, denial of due process, and a lack of meaningful oversight within probate court systems.

“This proceeding gives victims and advocates an opportunity to place their experiences on the public record,” said Tanya Dennis, lead facilitator of NPRC. “For too long, families have struggled to have their voices heard regarding elder abuse, probate exploitation, and government inaction. This forum allows those stories to be shared before a national audience.”

In keeping with principles of transparency and fairness, invitations have been extended to legislators, members of the judiciary, law enforcement representatives, and other public officials who may wish to respond to concerns raised during the proceedings or defend actions taken by their respective institutions.

One of the primary outcomes sought by organizers is public consideration and support for the People’s Remedy and Restoration Act, a proposed legislative framework that advocates believe would strengthen oversight, increase accountability, provide remedies for victims of governmental abuse, and restore constitutional protections.

The proceedings are expected to be broadcast nationally, providing citizens throughout the United States an opportunity to observe testimony, review evidence presented, and participate in an ongoing conversation regarding government accountability and the protection of individual rights.

Advocates hope the hearings will encourage meaningful dialogue, legislative reform, and renewed public engagement in the democratic process.

Individuals, organizations, public officials, and members of the media interested in attending or obtaining access information may contact the organizers at tollandroll2025@gmail.com.

As Americans continue to debate the future of constitutional governance, judicial accountability, and the protection of vulnerable citizens, the July proceedings are expected to serve as a significant forum for public testimony and civic engagement. For more information, go to https://tollandroll.com

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50 Years Later, ‘Wake Up Everybody!’ Still Resonates During Black Music

The words of the song, “Wake Up Everybody,” debuted by Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes in 1975, still resonate today as those words are just as relevant more than a half century later.

Published

1 week ago

June 26, 2026

Oakland Post

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By Hazel Trice Edney, Special to The Post

Hazel Trice Edney

“Wake up, everybody, No more sleepin’ in bed

No more backward thinkin’. Time for thinkin’ ahead

The world has changed so very much from what it used to be.

There is so much hatred, war, and poverty.

“The world won’t get no better If we just let it be.

Naw, naw, naw, naw, naw, naw, naw.

The world won’t get no better. We gotta change it, yeah– just you and me.”

The words of the song, “Wake Up Everybody,” debuted by Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes in 1975, still resonate today as those words are just as relevant more than a half century later.

In a rare, nearly somber moment, the group’s celebrated lead singer, Teddy Pendergrass, introduced the song on Soul Train, the weekly dance and live performance TV show that aired roughly between 1971 and 2006. Pendergrass told the attentive live audience and thousands watching by television that Wake Up Everybody, the title tune of their most recent album, was intended to inspire people to take action with a goal to change America for the better.

“I’m sure that you will all agree that there are things that need to be done in this country today,” he said. “So, what I’d like for you to do is listen very carefully to see what you can do to lend a hand.”

The song’s appeal worked.

“I played that song over and over and over again because it was a constant warning to keep ourselves prepared for the society that we were living in,” says A. Peter Bailey, then a 37-year-old former aide to Malcolm X.

When “Wake Up Everybody” hit the airwaves, Bailey was working as an associate editor of Ebony Magazine. “It was a call to be aware of what we were dealing with in the country that we lived in, the world we lived in, the neighborhood we lived in, the cities that we lived in,” Bailey said in an interview with the Trice Edney News Wire.

He concluded that during Black Music Month 2026, such songs should be recalled and celebrated as a key to changes for the good across America; especially because such songs successfully encouraged people to deal with the issues that might otherwise denigrate the promises of America, including the promise that “All men are created equal,”as stated in the Declaration of Independence.

“The rhythms and blues expressed our joys, our sorrows and our fears,” Bailey recalls. “It was those songs and the singing of those songs by our people that attracted us to the campaigns for justice.”

With his life inspired by that song and others, Bailey, now 88, went on to establish and teach a Black Press class at Virginia Commonwealth University. Also, he has since written three books, including a memoir, “Witnessing Brother Malcolm X, the Master Teacher,” in which he expounded upon successful principles of social justice, some of which are reflected in “Wake Up Everybody.”

Long before the term “woke” became associated with campaigns for justice, Pendergrass led the song that reverberated across America and still holds deep meaning.

The ‘wake up’ call exhorts teachers to ‘teach a new way,’ doctors to heal elders, and builders to ‘build a new land… we can do it if we all lend a hand.”

The song concludes:

“The world won’t get no better if we just let it be. Naw, naw, naw, naw, naw, naw, naw. The world won’t get no better. We gotta change it, yeah – just you and me.”

Hazel Trice Edney wrote this story as part of a four-part series powered by AARP in commemoration of Black Music Month, June 2026.