Families, Children and Social Policy - Essay Example

Families, children and social policy 2006 Poverty in America According to the Census Bureau figures, there were nearly 35.9 million people in America living poverty in 2003. This translates to about 13 percent of the population. Poverty rate of a country may be defined either in absolute terms or in relative terms. Absolute poverty is calculated by amount of family income that is required to survive whereas relative poverty may be defined when the family income is too low to afford the consumption pattern of the prevailing society. In the United States, unlike other developed countries in Europe and Asia, poverty rate is officially calculated in absolute terms. The absolute measure was adopted in 1964 when the Johnson administration declared a ‘war on poverty’. Since 1959, when the figure of poverty rate was first released, the number of people below the poverty level has remained between 30 and 40 million while the poverty rate has remained between 11 and 12 percent. The poverty rate reached the lowest point in 26 years in 2000, at 11.3 percent and increased again to 12.7 percent in 2004 (Census Bureau). The current official poverty rate for a family of four is an annual income of $19,806, which may be earned by the wage of about $9.50 an hour by a single-income family. The method of calculation has remained the same since the 1960s when the data was first offered by the Census and the estimates do not include taxes, home ownership, childcare and healthcare costs. The federal minimum wage rate is $5.15 an hour. On the other hand, relative poverty measured by the income difference between the rich and the poor, according to some estimates have been widening – while the bottom bracket income rose 17 percent over 1979 and 2003, the top bracket income rose by 200 percent (Bensen, 2006). Although the figure for poverty rate in America has been unchanged over the last 40 years or so, it is not that the standards of living are the same over the period. The Census Bureau notes that 46percent of poor households own homes, 76 percent have air conditioning, the average poor American household has more living space than those in Europe, nearly three-fourth of poor households own cars – 30 percent own two or more cars – 78 percent own a DVD or a VCR player and 72 percent own a microwave oven. The poor in America are not necessarily undernourished. However, the poor in America are typically troubled with paying their utility bills and other financial concerns. The housing boom over the last few years have meant that many Americans have owned houses with mortgages that they now find difficult to pay (Rector and Johnson, 2004). Some analysts point out to the fact that poverty in America is over-reported in official figures since it does not include cash income and government sponsored programs like Food Stamp, healthcare and public housing. On the other hand, other analysts point out that the official figure under-reports all items of necessity for a typical household and many families have to go without adequate clothing and medical care (U.S Department of State). Poverty and inequality in America is attributed by some analysts to the changing nature of the economy. While manufacturing contributed 27 percent of output and financial services 18 percent thirty years back, the former now contributes 22 percent while financial sector contributes 27 percent. This results in lower employment since financial services are more capital-intensive. Besides, outsourcing and greater share of imports in the country’s consumption is considered to be the other reasons for growing divergence of the rich and the power as well as the sustenance of poverty (Glasmeier, 2006). According to the Census reports, the recovery in economic growth in the United States has missed sections of the population and the poverty rate has never fallen below 11 percent. Poverty rates have been even higher for particular groups like African-Americans and the Hispanics and lower for Asians (Institute for Policy Research, 2004). Some analysts consider the increasing immigration of low-skilled population into the United States has resulted in high poverty rates. Simultaneously with the ‘war on poverty’ in the 1960s, immigration reforms have acted counter to the efforts to reduce poverty over the decades. It is found that nearly one-third of the immigrants live in families in which the head has less than a high school education. In particular, first generation immigrants, who make up one-sixth of the U.S population, have lower levels of education. This has an impact on child poverty, which has a higher rate than the average poverty rate, since 38percent of immigrant children have their parents who lack high school education (Rector, 2006). Thus, although absolute poverty in America has remained constant over the last 40 years, relative poverty has increased as a result of widening income gaps. Absolute poverty however does not include cash income as well as government funded programs. Although the poor in America have a better standard of living than in many other countries of the developed world, the increasing division between the rich and the poor is a result of the trends in the economy that has moved away from manufacturing, and higher immigration of low skilled workers. Works Cited Bensen, Amanda, Living on the edge: Above, poverty, many families still struggle, Post Star, August 5, 2006, http://www.povertyinamerica.psu.edu/ Census Bureau, Poverty in the United States, 2004, http://www.census.gov/prod/2005pubs/p60-222.pdf Rector, Robert E and Kirk A Johnson, Understanding Poverty in America, January 5, 2004, http://www.heritage.org/Research/Welfare/bg1713.cfm U.S Department of State, Poverty and Inequality in the United States, http://economics.about.com/od/howtheuseconomyworks/a/poverty.htm Glasmeier, Amy, Hard Work that Doesn’t Pay and Unequal Chances that Continue to Mount Characterize the Circumstances of Many Americans, October 15, 2006, http://www.povertyinamerica.psu.edu/ Institute for research on Poverty, Who was poor in 2004? http://www.irp.wisc.edu/faqs/faq3.htm Rector, Robert, E, Importing Poverty: Immigration and Poverty in the United States: A Book of Charts, October 15, 2006, http://www.heritage.org/Research/Immigration/SR9.cfm Mayoral control of public schools The falling performance of public schools has brought the focus of accountability and control of the schools. In many states, like Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and Boston, mayoral control of schools are expected to focus on accountability by making the mayor totally responsible for improving the school systems. Since the early 2000, there has been an increasing debate over mayoral control of public schools. In 2002, Mayor Richard M Dailey interfered in the inner city school, Dodge Elementary School, closed it for a year and introduced teacher partnership with a university. The school is often referred to as a model for mayoral control into public schools. Following this, mayors of other cities have also contemplated more control in failing public schools. Yet, even the Chicago school system, the third-largest in the country, is no role model since many other schools have been faring badly. Despite the mayor’s aggressive school reform policy including literacy campaigns, intervening in poorly performing schools and announcing the Renaissance Plan 2010 in 2004 by which under-achieving schools will be replaced by 100 innovative schools in six years, Chicago schools have performed poorly in test scores (Rubin, 2006). As a result of mayoral control, schools have become like corporate with greater involvement in financial prudence than in teaching. There are criticisms that the high profile plans like the Renaissance Plan 2010, instead of concerted efforts to upgrade the school system and get better teachers have been driven more by political agenda than thorough planning. Mayoral control is often the result of impatience and the hurry to change the system. The school boards of Chicago schools have more or less been left intact despite the mayoral control and schools claim that much of the improvement in the performance of the schools have been brought about by the schools themselves and not as a result of mayoral control (Rubin, 2006). Los Angeles, too, passed control of the public schools to the mayor although not as much as in Chicago. Many of the decision making powers have remained with the school boards. The boards lose control over the federal funds which falls under the purview of the superintendent, but remains responsible for the curriculum (Steinhaur, 2006). In New York, mayor Bloomberg has been responsible for the school system since 2002. He has taken some hard decisions over his tenure, like make promotional requirements for third graders tougher. Bloomberg has also been vociferous about taking crucial decisions in attacking education to reduce crime in inner city areas. The term is due to end in 2009 and there are apprehensions that the system will return to the past. The mayor has been criticized for being autocratic and not involving the school boards, parents or teachers in many of the decisions (Cardwell, 2006). New York City schools have seen higher test scores for fourth grade English since the mayor took control over them. However, critics point out that the scores have been better in Rochester, Syracuse and Yonkers where schools are not under mayoral control. Instead of taking test scores as the measure of school success, educators prefer the number of students graduating on time as a better indicator for the performance of schools. While the school system, particularly that of the public schools, has always been a contentious issue, mayoral control has increasingly been debated over in the recent times. Although very few educators and senators want a return of the system without mayoral control, most recognize that the system has become autocratic and centralized. The most critical element has been the sharing of expenses by the city and the school boards. Most opponents of the mayors, particularly of Bloomberg, criticize them for not getting enough money for the schools, which affect their performances (Robinson, 2005). The typical argument for mayoral control is the “bloated bureaucracy’ for the school system and greater need of accountability for spending instructions and services. From the New York example, it has been seen that mayoral control has not necessarily increased spending on instruction. Neither has it reduced the bureaucracy in the school system. Although there has been some increase in spending on instruction, there has been a marked decrease in spending on general and special education. Budget allocations have not reduced class sizes or raised course offerings. Budget for special education, indeed, has gone done since mayoral control became effective. On the other hand, spending on the central administration of the school system has increased over the period since mayoral control, offsetting the reduction in administration at the decentralized levels. Student-teacher ratio has not reduced, resulting on more overcrowding in classes (EPP, 2006). Thus, mayoral control has so far shown mixed results. While some of the schools have shown better test scores, others have not. The other factors that determine the performance of a school system, like the number of students graduating on time, the student-teacher ratio or the proportion of funds for special education, has not been largely affected by mayoral control in the states where it has existed. On the other hand, the system has become all the more centralized and autocratic. Works Cited Rubin, Joel, Chicago Schools Offer L.A. a Cautionary Tale, March 20, 2006, Los Angeles Times, http://ed.stanford.edu/suse/faculty/displayFacultyNews.php?tablename=notify1&id=505 Steinhaur, Jennifer, Los Angeles Mayor Gains Control of the Schools, but Hardly Total Control, New York Times, August 31, 2006, http://travel.nytimes.com/2006/08/31/education/31takeover.html?n=Top%2FReference%2FTimes%20Topics%2FPeople%2FV%2FVillaraigosa%2C%20Antonio Cardwell, Diane, Bloomberg Re-emphasizes School Control, September 20, 2006, New York Times, September 20, 2006, http://travel.nytimes.com/2006/09/20/nyregion/20schools.html?n=Top%2FReference%2FTimes%20Topics%2FPeople%2FB%2FBloomberg%2C%20Michael%20R. Robinson, Gail, Campaign 2005: After Mayoral Control, Rivals Call For More Changes, Gotham Gazette, August 2005, http://www.gothamgazette.com/article//20050805/6/1509 Educational Priorities Panel (EPP), Adding Up the Numbers: The Education Budget Under Mayoral Control, http://www.edpriorities.org/Info/CityBudget/Bulletin_2Jan06.pdf School choice voucher programs and charter schools Since the 1980s, school choice has been a highly politicized and contentious subject in the United States. School choice voucher programs and charter schools are aimed at bridging the gap between the privileged and underprivileged in access of education but the policies have continued to be a severely debated subject. To deal with the problem, various types of school systems have been developed to allow Americans to choose schools for their children. For example, the controlled choice school system allows parents to choose schools in the district but each school needs to maintain racial balance. Hence, there is an implicit bar on school choice that parents face for their children. Magnet schools, on the other hand, are intra-district plans that are somewhat in between the controlled choice system and the district assignment one. These schools function on the basis of a particular education philosophy and are widely used in many states to desegregate the society in the North. Charter schools are another popular system that is based on the philosophy of knowledge-driven rather than entitlement-driven purpose (uoregon). It is often argued that children of minority families and those requiring special needs lag behind primarily because of inadequate education provisions in the traditional school model based on district-assigned schools. The enactment of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) in 2002 aimed at raising the performance standards of students in math and reading as well as providing parents school choice if the assigned schools within the locality of their residence did not meet their expectations. On the other hand, it has also been argued that school choice results in elitism as wealthy parents tend to select schools of their choice while the underprivileged parents choose schools not on the basis of academic considerations but more on account of feeling safe in minority schools. The issue of desegregation remains a highly debated topic, with both the advocates and opponents of school choice arguing over it. While most parents want their children attend schools near to the locality that they reside in, many tend to choose schools on the basis of “academic, religious, or moral environment and convenience” (National Center for Education Statistics, 1997, cited in uoregon). Typically, white rich people prefer school choice for their children while most black and poor people attend public schools. According to a survey of parents in 1999-2000, only about 25 percent students attended public schools away from their place of residence. Further, public-choice enrollment has been growing faster than private school enrolments (Schnaiberg 1999, cited in uoregon). The question of school choice has provoked serious sentiments precisely because it involves two issues that are crucial to American society – freedom of decision over education choice and equity in providing education. While, in a free society, it is desirable that all citizens should have the right to choose the type of education, it is also crucially important that there should be equitable access to education for all. However, it has been seen that underprivileged sections of the society do not have access to quality education even when there is no legislative bar. Education policy makers in the United States face the baffling problem of the two directly opposing points of view. While the supporters of school choice assert that low income families are just as capable of sending their children to the schools they would choose on the basis of academics as the high income families do. Further, low-income inner-city families would benefit if their children went to private desgregated schools, economically as well as socially. Private schools not only promote racial harmony, the schools too perform better since parents are more involved with the schools of their choice and higher expectations on them force them to upgrade their standards. On the other hand, the opponents of school choice insist that the low income families choose the school for their children more out of economic and social considerations rather than because of academic standards. The learning gains in private schools are more because these schools attract students from privileged families and have more funds to employ better teachers. Not only are private schools elitist, the rules on dress and other social codes hinder creativity and social integration. In most cases, the social milieu in the private schools makes students from low-income families apprehensive (heartland). Despite the attempts, school choice has not really resulted in desegregation. Besides racial differentiation, economic disparity has become apparent in the school system. Elmore and Fuller (1996), too, show that the past one and half-a - decade have witnessed "an increase in the racial, ethnic, and economic isolation of students in American public schools". This is not so in private schools erhaps because of the automatic screening of students in these schools. The privileged sections who send their children to these schools represent the swanky, sheen of market economy that apparently is generous enough to interrelate cutting across the racial barriers, the monitory divisions of class being already settled. The have-nots have been already denied of entrance in that private system. Works Cited School Choice, http://eric.uoregon.edu/trends_issues/choice/index.html http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=12017 Elmore Richard F., Fuller, Bruce Who Chooses? Who Loses? Culture, Institutions, and the Unequal Effects of School Choice, New York: Teachers College Press, 1996 Read More