After the publication of the latest PISA report, in which 15-year-old students USA show a regression in mathematics but modest gains in reading comprehension and science, Joe Biden’s Secretary of Education, Miguel Cardona, wanted to celebrate, although cautiously, the bright spots. Especially the US rise in world rankings despite the losses in mathematics, where it ranks 28th out of 37 countries. Cardona assured that the 122 billion in federal aid that have been allocated to educational recovery after the pandemic “have allowed us to remain competitive”.
That moderately optimistic tone, even when the US invests much more in education per student than other countries, clashes with the data provided by national studies. Months before the publication of the PISA report, for example, both the spring report of the National Assessment of Educational Progresswhich is considered the national analysis par excellence, and another presented in July by the specialized group NWEA, made a most worrying x-rayand ratified a trend of setbacks that began a decade ago.
Greater regression
The regression in mathematicsAccording to these studies, it is the largest ever recorded and places US students at the level they had in 1990. Also in reading comprehension there’s a decline to 2004 levels. And it is estimated that students would need on average four and a half additional months of instruction in mathematics and four in reading comprehension to match the pre-pandemic level. Only the youngest ones show signs of improvement.
The slight optimism of the Administration It also collides with the much more severe and discouraging analyzes made by an overwhelming majority of experts on the situation of American education, which also for the first time has suffered losses in history or civic education. According to scholars, the pandemic has caused a regression not seen in two decades, it has increased the gaps between students based on race and economic status of families and has left what some have called “persistent covid in education.”
Issues
There is a chronic absenteeism epidemic (those who miss more than 10% of classes). And although the problem is more pronounced in poorer school districts, it is also seen in wealthy schools. The lack of teachers that was exacerbated by the pandemic persists, with the 45% of schools with teacher shortages according to federal data. AND the funds that Washington approvedof which only 20% had to go directly to combat the setbacks, They will sell out at the end of next year. Many managements have already resisted using them to hire professionals due to the impossibility of maintaining salaries when the federal tap is closed. “We call 2024-2025 the bleeding,” warned Marguerite Roza, director of the Edunomics Lab at Georgetown University. “Public education has never seen a fiscal cliff of this magnitudeincluding the last recession.
Furthermore, American education is hampered by having lowered standards in qualifications, as Michael Petrill, president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, explained in an article in September. In an attempt to reduce student stress, failures have been eliminated or credits have been given for work that is delivered late or incomplete, and this has helped a “inflation” in the ratings that contributes to the disconnection between reality and what parents perceive.
Maximum educational alarm
Economists predict that this generationwith the significant educational gap that is being recorded, will access worst salaries and will become a significant drag on the economy. And there is extreme concern because, despite the seriousness, it is not seen that the situation is causing in federal, state and local authorities, as well as in schools and families, the alarmthe reaction and the sense of urgency that would be necessary.
“This is one top class fire alarm but the majority of elected officials They don’t respond or even talk about it”, he denounced in a tough article this summer by businessman, former New York mayor and philanthropist Michael Bloombergwhich disfigured Biden the lack of a plan from Washington, a joint session of Congress or a speech from the Oval Office.
Solutions
When it comes to proposing solutions, the recipes already applied or proposed are varied. Tom Kane and Sean Reardon, education specialists at Harvard and Stanford, say it is essential to significantly increase instruction time and have raised, for example, the need for the authorities promote summer schools and extracurricular activities more (with notable access gaps depending on economic and racial conditions).
They also propose that school boards begin to negotiate to extend the school year, to start planning long-term change policies and ideas how to add another year in high school which could serve to fill learning gaps, while offering help to apply to the university cycle or exploit other career opportunities.
There are those who look with hope at the results of the “high-impact tutoring”, which are carried out with small groups of between one and four students, three times a week throughout the course and lasting at least 30 minutes. But according to a federal survey at the end of last year, they were only carried out in 37% of centers, and they require a lot of work and high-quality instruction, difficult in many cases due to the shortage of teachers.
Likewise, a study by the Stanford Center for Educational Outcomes Research carried out in 16 states found that the most effective way to reverse losses is increase the pace at which students learn and one of his proposal was that teachers with extraordinary results be compensated with extra salaries to accept more students.
Challenges
The challenges and barriers are also numerous. exist political complications, with a clear gap open between Democrats and Republicans. President Biden, for example, wants to raise the education budget by about 14% and reinforce Title 1, which supports schools where high percentages of students live in poverty, while the Republican proposal in Congress is to cut 28%. funds from the Department of Education and 80% Title 1.
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Added to this is the aforementioned lack of general alarm, the resistance of teachers’ unions and parents to some changess and a dominant rejection of more punitive measureslike forcing them to repeat a course.
While, public education in the US declineswith an increase in families choosing private schools, concerted or for educating in home. The latter, the ‘homeschooling’, This is according to a recent analysis by ‘The Washington Post’ the form of education that is growing the most in the country: 45% compared to before the pandemic, now far from the image of religious extremism that marked her for decades and now chosen by a wide spectrum of parents.