Inequities in STEM.edu, Part One

Forward: Lately, I have seen a lot of  conversations in person and through social media about what to put in a the newest trend of education, Maker Spaces. A conversation I am more intrigued by is why this is the hot topic? A conversation I am more intrigued by looks at this subject through a wider lens. I want to have the conversation of how to create a K-12 curriculum that is socially responsible, driven by inquiry and is designed for every school from suburb to urban.  How do we turn this conversation to action and how do we know it has ended successfully? This series of posts will be about the American initiative for STEM education and the role that standardized testing continues to play in perpetuating its inequities in underserved schools. This is me starting the conversation for action. In an effort to go forward, I begin with the facts.

(An insanely boring & necessary list of resources that I used to write all of this. )

Part One:

    There is a large group of students in the United States that are not being democratically served in the initiative for STEM education in American public schools. Students in underserved schools who are culturally and linguistically diverse are being failed in the current, complex Kindergarten to college STEM pipeline. Their right to be educated, to become the best version of themselves, has been compromised by an institution that places more value on systematic standardization than authentic student voice.

     The losses that students in underserved schools face are too costly to ignore. First is an absence of qualified teachers. Eighth-grade students from low-income families were less likely to have science teachers with regular or advanced certifications, a degree in science, and more than three years experience teaching science (Howard-Brown, Martinez, 2012). In 2012, The National Science Foundation reported reported 41% of teachers in high-poverty schools had masters degrees in Math or Science compared to 61% in low-poverty schools.

Next, is the access to basic STEM Materials such as up-to-date laboratories, computers and quality internet access (Williams, 2014). With a closer look, these underserved schools are helplessly dependent on a circular system; in order to provide the basics, they need the funding that is a reward from students performing well on high-stakes tests. Yet, it is the regulated teaching methods and disconnected curriculum followed to pass these tests that fail students the most. For example, in Texas, after years of standardized testing, over 50 percent of all black and Latino ninth-graders did not make it to graduation (McNeil, 2000).

These students are deprived of higher-level concepts and meaningful, relevant instruction time in exchange for lessons on building strategic test skills (Raising the Bar, n.d.). From a broader view, this is a symptom of schools becoming arenas of the dominant test-taking ideology: rote memorization, impersonal teaching methods and a fixed timeline to achieve on high-stakes testing (Raising the Bar, n.d.). Schools have become outlets for grooming masters of recall rather than architects of inquiry (Flinders & Thornton, 2013a). Teachers are timid to protest with oppositional ideologies because their ability to raise student growth percentile is valued more than a connected, genuine student experience (Darder et al., 2003a). The message for “sameness” intended by standardized testing and the push for “STEM for all” in underserved schools is disconnected from the real needs of students and the teaching methods that will best prepare our students to become the best version of themselves.

What language and message are we sending to students when their learning environment shows no attempt to connect to their daily lives and cheers of test scores outweigh their authentic voice? If we know what we are doing is wrong, how do we become empowered to stop?

To be continued...