#NatureTwinning Part 62
Chilean Wine Palm--Thursday, 5/10/18
The idea was that the aqua pants would pick up the subtle lighter blue color in the center of the flowers. Maybe that was too subtle.
Outfit cost per wear (OCPW): $11.54
There was nothing subtle about the myriad palm trees we encountered in Los Angeles, though.
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| Los Angeles Arboretum |
In other news...The findings of a recent study on the effectiveness of PreK programs surprised me and the economist conducting the research, as reported here. (Caveat: I was unable to get the link to the entire paper to work for me, so I'm going with what was reported.)
A lot of people favor using PreK money to target the most needy (low income) students, as that group of kids enters kindergarten with an academic deficit compared to higher income students that is extremely difficult to make up. (A lot of these kids just fall farther and farther behind their higher income peers as the years go on.) Universal PreK programs don't seem to be necessary because students from the middle class and up don't need the boost academically, and extending paid PreK to all these students would be very expensive. This logic makes sense to me.
But a new study that compares the outcomes for low income students in states with targeted programs to low income students in states with universal programs suggests that the universal approach might be better. Controlling for the other demographic factors that you expect, etc., she finds that universal programs increase reading ability for low income kids but targeted programs do not. (Universal programs have a positive but not statistically significant effect for math ability while targeted programs show no effect.) Critically, she finds that the universal programs are also more cost effective than targeted programs, even though they are much more expensive, because the academic gains for low income students are so much greater in the universal programs.
These outcomes surprise me--especially the cost-benefit analysis--but they are in keeping with other things I've read about the beneficial effects for black students attending non-segregated schools. In both cases, disadvantaged students do better when they are in programs with a significant number of more advantaged students than when they are in programs with only/mostly other disadvantaged students.
In the PreK case, it also makes sense that the greater benefit of higher income peers would occur for reading, since students in a class together would interact using language (not math), and it's well-known that students from low income households have less exposure to words overall and advanced vocabulary in particular than higher income students.
I think it's also worth considering whether higher income/white parents are more effective at placing pressure on teachers/schools to do their jobs well and ensuring that schools/classrooms are well resourced (e.g., through PTA organizations that supplement public funds, through political pressure, or more informally). There are probably other effects I'm not thinking of right now.
Do the results of this study sound reasonable to you? Any thoughts on what might driving the results?
2 comments:
Perhaps being in a classroom with advantaged children gives the disadvantaged children awareness of what they could be capable of, the way older siblings influence younger siblings.
Mom, that's another good possibility.
I also wondered whether having a more mixed group of kids also normalizes academic tasks and activities (reading, studying, etc.) that might be more stigmatized/unusual in a group made up entirely of disadvantaged kids.
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