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The Lasting Impact of the Verbal Gap
 n the Spring of 2003, the Policy
Information Center of Educational Testing Service (ETS) published a report called
Reading and Literacy in America, describing the wide and growing
literacy gap between American social classes, one they
could trace all the way back to kindergarten. According
to ETS research, little of what occurs between kindergarten
and 12th grade changes the chasm of achievement uncovered in the findings
of Hart and Risley:
"Disturbing, however, is the finding that the large differentials
in reading scores that we see by the fourth grade are already there
when children enter kindergarten. While 71 percent of White kindergartners — and
80 percent of Asian kindergartners — could recognize letters
of the alphabet when they started in the fall, just 59 percent of
Black and 51 percent of Hispanic kindergartners could do so.[1]
"In terms of race and ethnicity, 40 percent of White fourth
graders were proficient in reading, compared with 46 of Asian, 12
percent of Black, and 16 percent of Hispanic fourth graders. In statistical
terms of standard deviations, these differentials are of a similar
magnitude to those found in kindergarten and first grade. The differentials
present at the beginning persist through the years of public education.
Updated for adulthood, ETS found the average reading proficiency
of Black Americans to be 237 compared to 286 for White
Americans. This, in turn, translates into deep economic
divisions between the races as shown in the ETS chart
below. In addition, this difference in literacy
and income translates into yet another disenfranchisement
at the voting booth where just over 5 in 10 adults
who scored at Level 1 voted
in the last five years, while 9 in 10 of
those at Level 5 had voted. Simply
put: less education translates into less income, which
translates into less of a voice in democracy.
Average Weekly Wage by Reading Level
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SOURCE: Paul E. Barton and Archie Lapointe, Learning
by Degrees: Indicators of Performance in Higher
Education, Policy Information Center,
Educational Testing Service, 1995. ED 379 323 |
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FOOTNOTES:
1. See Richard J. Coley, An Uneven
Start: Indicators of Inequality in School Readiness,
Policy Information Report, Policy Information Center,
Educational Testing Service, March 2002. www.ets.org/research/pic/unevenstart.pdf
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