The Opportunity Equation
How Citizen Teachers Are Combating the Achievement Gap in America's Schools
1 of 1 copy available
Parental wealth now predicts adult success more than at any point in the last hundred years. And yet as debates about education rage on, and wealth-based achievement gaps grow, too many people fix the blame on one of two convenient scapegoats: poverty or our public schools. But in fact, low-income kids are learning more now than ever before. The real culprit for rising inequality, Eric Schwarz argues in The Opportunity Equation, is that wealthier kids are learning much, much more—mostly outside of school. In summer camps, robotics competitions, sessions with private tutors, and conversations around the dinner table, children from more affluent families build the skills and social networks that propel them to success.
In The Opportunity Equation, Schwarz tells the story of how he founded the pioneering Citizen Schools program to combat rising inequality by bringing these same opportunities to children who don’t have access to them. By increasing learning time in schools and harnessing the power of an army of volunteers with various skills and professional backgrounds—lawyers, engineers, carpenters, journalists, nonprofit leaders, and grandmothers who sew—Citizen Schools offers after-school apprenticeships that provide the building blocks for adult success.
Recounting the triumphs and setbacks he’s encountered in implementing the program, Schwarz shows that some of the nation’s lowest-performing schools in its lowest-income cities can, with help, provide their students with many of the same experiences wealthy communities afford to their children. The results have been proven: in the dozen school districts, from New York to Oakland, that have partnered with Citizen Schools, rates of attendance, proficiency, graduation, and college acceptance have gone up—and the achievement gap closes.
At a time when many stakeholders in the education debates are looking for new, silver-bullet shortcuts to educational excellence, Schwarz shows that the best solution is human-centered, rooted in the American tradition of citizen voluntarism, and, most important, achievable. We can provide quality education for all students and close the opportunity gap in this country—and we can do it together.
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
September 2, 2014 -
Formats
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Kindle Book
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OverDrive Read
- ISBN: 9780807033739
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EPUB ebook
- ISBN: 9780807033739
- File size: 2191 KB
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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June 2, 2014
Both a practical policy primer and a memoir, Schwarz persuasively demonstrates that the so-called educational achievement gap is rooted in opportunity and resources—not willingness or ability—and proposes accessible solutions to close the gap. With a keen and forthright eye, he employs his own experience as a child born into privilege to establish that if the advantages lavished on him were available to children from all points on the economic spectrum, achievement and prospects for future accomplishments would also be weighted equally. He founded Citizen Schools in 1995 to provide volunteer tutoring and enrichment classes to low-performing public schools in the Boston area. With a growing number of partnerships with public schools, the organization continues to evolve, providing volunteer teachers and extended learning time for resource-strapped schools in several states. Combining data-rich statistics with frequently funny and animated accounts of his work with Citizen Schools, including a bracing candor about mistakes and learning on the fly, Schwarz offers an inspiring chronicle of scholarly triumphs and generous citizen activism, as well as a constructive blueprint for boosting achievement without abandoning public education. -
July 15, 2014
An inside look at the Citizen Schools program.From its inception to its current success, Schwarz gives readers a detailed history of the after-school program he founded in 1995. As a descendent of the FAO Schwarz toy store family, the author's childhood "was piled high with the building blocks of opportunity." Surrounded by high-achieving professional adults who formed a "powerful social network," success was almost guaranteed due to the extra chances to learn and grow. Soon, Schwarz realized that not everyone had the same breaks in life, so he started the Citizen Schools program to help balance the equation. He sought to expose low-income students to mentoring, sports, art, music, and creative and innovative solutions to everyday problems. By extending the school day by three hours, hiring AmeriCorps teaching fellows and asking adult volunteers to help teach a variety of skills, Schwarz was able to implement his plan. Not only do the extra three hours provide a safe haven for children who might otherwise wind up on the streets, but the time also allows parents better access to information about their children since the citizen volunteers are able to make phone calls and conduct meetings that the full-time teachers don't have time to do. Through personal stories and chronological notes, Schwarz shows the necessary steps he and his fellow workers use to implement changes in the way children are taught. He provides thorough analysis of the success he's been able to achieve, including better test results, greater high school graduation rates and increased college acceptance rates. Straightforward and informational, Schwarz's brief book is a call to action for citizens and educators so that the achievement gap can be closed as rapidly as possible.Motivational information on how ordinary citizens can make a huge difference in the American educational system.COPYRIGHT(2014) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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