Mike hopes that education-types will not be ?distracted by the [achievement] gap.? The ?real goal,? he says, is ?improvements for all groups of kids.? But is that so? Yes, writes the New Republic's Jonathan Chait:
Taken literally, it's bad news when whites pull ahead faster than blacks. But nobody actually takes it that literally. Blacks and whites are not engaged in some zero sum education contest. The point is to raise everybody's scores, wtih [sic] a special emphasis on bringing up the scores of African-Americans, who trail badly.
This would be true only if what it?meant to ?be educated? were quantifiable?that is, if upon attainment of a specified amount of knowledge, say,?one were thereby?designated an ?educated person.? But this is not so. In fact, contrary to Chait's claim, everyone is ?engaged in some zero sum education contest.? A person is designated learned in the same way he is designated rich or poor, pulchritudinous or repulsive: in relation to other people. For such adjectives there are no objective standards. When I say, ?He is a wealthy man,? what I really mean is, ?He possesses more money than most other people in his society.?
And so one thinks: Perhaps achievement gaps not only matter but matter more than?all other K-12-related data.
?Liam Julian