The Scare Tactic

Something to sleep on:

• While one out of 12 white students can competently read form a specialized text (such as the science section of the newspaper), only about one out of 50 Latino students and one out of 100 African American students are able to gain information from specialized text. 
• One in 30 Latino students and one in 100 African American students can complete multi-step, elementary-algebra problems that one out of 10 White students can complete comfortably. 
• Three out of 10 African American students and four out of 10 Latino students have mastered usage and computation of fractions, percents, and averages. Meanwhile, seven of 10 White students have mastered these same skills. 
• Overall, "near the end of high school, in fact, African American and Latino students have skills in both reading and mathematics that are virtually the same as those of White students in the 8th grade."

"Nearly 70 percent of inner-city and rural fourth graders cannot read, even at a basic level. It is our greatest failure as a nation. It is our failure as a people." - Former US Secretary of Education Rod Paige

Haycock, Kati. (2001). Helping All Students Achieve. Educational Leadership, 58 (6).