k “ one in the Globe showing that there is a stubborn achievement gap based on income in Massachusetts using the MCAS as a measure; and two by EPI (the Economic Policy Institute) showing that the wealth disparity between the haves and the have nots is growing at an alarming rate.
Here’s an excerpt from the Globe report:
“Educators have made only modest gains in narrowing the gulf in achievement between low-income students and those who are better off, despite aggressive reform efforts aimed at boosting classroom performance of underprivileged children.”
“The latest statewide MCAS scores show students who qualify for free or reduced-price school lunches lag the student population overall by about 20 percentage points across grades and subjects.”
And here’s an excerpt from the EPI Report:
“Last week, we highlighted that the vast majority of gains in wealth since 1983 accrued to the top 5 percent of households and actually declined for the bottom 60 percent. Perhaps the statistic that best illustrates the disparity is median wealth, which is the wealth of the household that has more wealth than half of households and less than the other half…
It is also sobering to examine the racial difference in wealth trends. Wealth for the median black household has nearly disappeared, falling from $6,300 in 1983 to $2,200 in 2009 – a decrease of more than 65 percent. This means half of black households have less than $2,200 in wealth. Among white households, median wealth has fallen substantially since 2007, but at $97,900, remains higher than the 1983 level of $94,100. White median wealth is now 44.5 times higher than black median wealth.”