Fifty years after Brown, how far has our nation come in providing equal educational opportunity? Not far enough, if you consider the persistent achievement gap between black and white students. This gap, which narrowed in the 1960s and ’70s, widened again in the late 1980s. Sadly, the statistics are clear: A 2001 report by the Center on Education Policy shows that African-American students still score “significantly lower” than white students on achievement tests.

Experts differ on the causes of the achievement gap. Playing a large role are child poverty (27 percent for African-American and Hispanic children versus 13 percent for white children) and parents’ education attainment levels. The AFT supports a variety of strategies to close the gap—reducing class sizes, increasing the number of minority students who take rigorous courses, and investing in early childhood education programs such as Head Start, Even Start and Kindergarten-Plus. “We know now that the achievement gap for poor children is established before they even begin school. The best solution is obvious—universal access to high-quality preschool, with priority given to poor children,” AFT president Sandra Feldman says.

American Teacher talked with AFT vice president Tom Mooney, chair of the AFT preK-12 program and policy council, about teacher-centered strategies for closing the achievement gap. Here are some of his views:

On funding inequities: If we’re serious about honoring the legacy and spirit of Brown, we need to ensure that all children start with an equitable financial base for their education. We still have school-funding systems that favor the already affluent. It’s not subtle. In Ohio, the ratio of funding in affluent versus poor school districts is three to one. It’s also clear that judicial solutions alone won’t fix that problem—you have to organize, to create the political will for equal funding.

On improving teacher preparation and retention: Advocates are right to hammer at the issue of teacher quality when it comes to the achievement gap. The answer includes working with colleges to create teacher education programs with strong content preparation—and extended field experience, including an internship guided by experienced teachers. Then, beginning teachers need mentors, not just a buddy system. These measures will cut our high attrition rates.
When it comes to attracting mid-career professionals to teaching, especially in hard-to-staff schools, we need rigorous programs for alternative licensure. But we in K-12 have to connect with colleges and help them bridge the difficulties of entering mid-career for people who want to teach—or for recent graduates who decide they want to teach. Of course, we also need college loans, grants and other incentives to attract young teachers to hard-to-staff schools.

On attracting experienced and highly qualified teachers to hard-to-staff, high-need schools: We cannot, as a profession, continue to assign the least experienced teachers to the neediest students—we have to take charge and be part of the solution. I don’t think we can force people to teach in hard-to-staff schools. But you can invest in incentives for teachers to come to these schools and stay. You have to have some way of identifying highly skilled teachers (such as National Board for Professional Teaching Standards certification or locally developed career ladder programs) and rewards for teaching in hard-to-staff schools.

On NCLB: We’re mandating remedies in NCLB, such as school choice and after-school curricula, with just no proof that those remedies work. Meanwhile NCLB doesn’t require supplemental service providers or charter schools to hire qualified teachers. It’s a huge breakthrough that the federal government has made it a national priority to push hard for all students to meet high educational standards. But in terms of making it happen, [the government] doesn’t have it right yet, and teachers know it. It’s urgent that Congress move as quickly as possible to correct what it got wrong, including fully funding NCLB and investing in sound research-based approaches to raising achievement and closing the achievement gap.