David Sirota at Salon goes on a tirade, claiming that we do not need to reform public schools because poor kids do badly cuz they iz poor.
This article is rather stupid. YES poverty is a very, very bad thing. Yes, as Sirota highlights, studies show that 2/3 of the variation among Americas schools can be attributed to “outside” variables .. family and poverty.
2/3 is not 100%. If anything, Sirota’s data says something shocking .. 1/3 of the problem is due to bad schools!
He also horribly mis-states how charter schools work. The notion that they drain any dollars from “public” schools is inane. The per-capita funding for all public schools ..traditional or charter .. is exactly the same.
Similarly, there is something positively rotten in Sirota’s argument that poor kids in public schools do not benefit from computers and other technology while he also argues that public schools in wealthy neighbrh
oods are good for rich kids (whose districts and parents provide that tech).
oods are good for rich kids (whose districts and parents provide that tech).