The other day, when Goals 2000 passed in the Congress, a CNN
reporter commented that she didn't know what good goals and standards would do because not all kids had the same wherewithal to achieve them.
This is a version of the argument you often hear against establishing high educational standards -- and holding kids to them: doing so would be unfair and elitist. A few kids might meet the standards, but wouldn't the great number who did not become discouraged with school and disgusted with themselves? And wouldn't high standards be especially unfair to poor minority youngsters who already have enough problems?
The elitism argument is based on the premise that youngsters succeed in school because they are smart-- not because they work hard -- and it's unfair to reward some kids more than others simply because God gave them more brains. This argument falls apart when you compare our students with kids from other countries -- like Japan, for instance, where large numbers perform at a very high level. Are Japanese youngsters
born smarter than American kids? Hardly. The Japanese secret is that parents, teachers -- and kids -- believe that doing well is, to a large extent, the result of hard work. And the Japanese education system demands and rewards this kind of effort.
But would demanding educational standards be fair to poor, minority children? The best answer to this question is to look at the watered-down curriculums that many of these kids now get. Their effect is to cut off virtually any hope that poor youngsters today can follow the traditional path out of poverty, education. The people who assume that these kids would be harmed, instead of helped, by a demanding curriculum have it backwards. Indeed, there is a lot of data indicating that such a curriculum would help all kids to do better.
Achievement in countries with high national standards provides some of the best evidence. A recent study finds that students in Great Britain, which, until recently, had a system with varying local standards, do much worse than youngsters in Germany, France and Japan, which have national standards. In "Educational Provision, Educational Attainment and the Needs of Industry" (London: National Institute of Economic and Social Research, 1993), Andy Green and Hilary Steedman say that, while varying local standards resulted in a good education for elite students, they produced a poor education and outcomes for everyone else, particularly lower-class kids. There is a marked inequality of opportunity in comparison with Germany, France or Japan.
On international math and science exams, English 13-year-olds have consistently scored close to the bottom. More significant from the standpoint of equity, however, was the fact that low-achieving English kids scored poorly relative to low achievers from other countries. On one international math exam, for example, England had the largest percentage of students with a score of 5 or less (out of a possible 70). In terms of general attainment, 16-year-old English students also did much less well. More than twice as many German and French students as English students were able to pass exams indicating proficiency in math, science and their native language. In Japan, where 16-year-olds took comparable exams in math only, almost twice as many passed. The pattern was roughly the same for students graduating from secondary school. The countries with high standards produced a far higher percentage of students who qualified for university or skilled jobs.
Why do education systems in Germany, France and Japan leave fewer students behind than the system in England? Green and Steedman point to a number of factors they think are critical:
-- Germany, France and Japan have high expectations for all their students, and students know what is expected of them.
-- They have curricula that embody these expectations and create "uniform practice." So you would rarely find some schools where kids are supposed to work hard and achieve and other schools where little is expected of students.
-- They have exams that test students' mastery -- not their ability -- and doing well on these exams gets students something they want, like admission to a university or a job credential.
Do these countries with standards-driven systems educate all their students to the same high level? No, and many of the differences in achievement are the result of poverty and inequality of opportunity. Nevertheless, they consistently do better with more of their students and with poor students than the former system in England -- or the current system in the U.S.
Many reformers are paralyzed by what they see as a conflict between high expectations and equity. But some of the world's best education systems tell us that equity is better served by demanding a lot of all students -- and helping them meet those demands. Inequalities may remain, but everybody is better off because they are unequal on a higher level.