Council of the Great City Schools
June 2002
This is a valuable compilation of data for anyone trying to understand and improve urban education in the United States. Building on its 2001 report Beating the Odds-the first report to examine the status and progress of America's urban schools on state reading and math tests-the Council of the Great City Schools (CGCS) seeks to answer two fundamental questions: "Are urban schools improving academically?" and "Are urban schools closing achievement gaps?" The answer to both questions is "yes but not fast enough." Analyzing data from 57 big-city school systems in reading and math, the authors found encouraging evidence of gains in math and reading and a narrowing of achievement gaps, but despite a trend line that's pointing in the right direction, students in urban schools still score well below national averages in math and reading. More obviously needs to be done to improve urban education, but the report has some interesting things to say about the reasons for the improvement that we've seen thus far in big city schools. Until about six years ago, CGCS suggests, scores were stagnant in urban schools. This began to change when urban educators began to buy into the standards movement, which clarified why they were in the field of education in the first place, and what they were being held responsible for delivering. A fascinating subplot is the story of how reform efforts initiated by the federal government slowly trickle down to change behavior in urban districts. The standards movement was born in the mid-1980s, but it took almost ten years to impact America's urban schools. Beating the Odds II is worth reading. To do so, proceed to http://www.cgcs.org/reports/beat_the_oddsII.html.
