Special Report
Education

School Climate

By Lynn Olson & Craig D. Jerald — January 08, 1998 2 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

Parents want their children to go to school in a place where they will be safe, and where the environment is focused on teaching and learning. Many such schools exist in our big cities. But not enough.

Size alone is one problem. Both schools and classes tend to be bigger in urban areas than in nonurban areas, even though the needs of the children are often greater.

High school students in the 74 big-city districts examined by Quality Counts are 25 percent more likely than the average U.S. teenager to attend a school with more than 900 students.

Many of these giant school’ resemble vast warehouses where students float anonymously through what passes for an education. Where they can skip school and no one will notice. Where the first sight to greet them when they walk through the door each morning is a metal detector or a police officer checking for weapons.

In November, the principal of a Baltimore high school suspended 1,200 of the school’s 1,800 students after they refused to return to their homerooms to pick up their report cards. Observers described a school in which discipline was almost nonexistent.

But problems are not limited to the high schools. In her book Ghetto Schooling: A Political Economy of Urban Educational Reform, Rutgers University professor Jean Anyon describes a 2nd grade classroom in Newark, N.J., that reeks of urine, where children bounce in and out of their seats, out of control. She argues that the sense of hopelessness and anger that pervades such schools mirrors the economic and political devastation of America’s inner cities.

Compared with their nonurban colleagues, urban school officials are far more likely to identify a lack of parent involvement as a moderate or serious problem in their schools. And urban teachers are more critical of the caliber of their students and of the schools they work in.

Faced with such conditions, many students simply stop coming to school every day. More than a third of Baltimore’s students were absent more than 20 days in 1996. The average Chicago 10th grader is absent six weeks of instructional time per year. At one particularly troubled school, the Consortium on Chicago School Research reported, the average student missed about half of his instructional time in at least one major subject. “In these schools,” the researchers wrote, “norms have disintegrated to the point that class attendance appears optional.”

Teachers in urban districts also are much more likely to report that weapons and physical conflicts among students are a problem. In New Orleans, a majority of teachers and students surveyed last year said drugs and weapons were present on campus. And members of the Memphis teachers’ union rated safety and discipline as their No.1 concern in a 1996 survey for the first time in 20 years.

In March 2024, Education Week announced the end of the Quality Counts report after 25 years of serving as a comprehensive K-12 education scorecard. In response to new challenges and a shifting landscape, we are refocusing our efforts on research and analysis to better serve the K-12 community. For more information, please go here for the full context or learn more about the EdWeek Research Center.

A version of this article appeared in the January 08, 1998 edition of Education Week as School Climate

Events

Jobs Virtual Career Fair for Teachers and K-12 Staff
Find teaching jobs and other jobs in K-12 education at the EdWeek Top School Jobs virtual career fair.
Ed-Tech Policy Webinar Artificial Intelligence in Practice: Building a Roadmap for AI Use in Schools
AI in education: game-changer or classroom chaos? Join our webinar & learn how to navigate this evolving tech responsibly.
Education Webinar Developing and Executing Impactful Research Campaigns to Fuel Your Ed Marketing Strategy 
Develop impactful research campaigns to fuel your marketing. Join the EdWeek Research Center for a webinar with actionable take-aways for companies who sell to K-12 districts.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

Education Briefly Stated: March 13, 2024
Here's a look at some recent Education Week articles you may have missed.
9 min read
Education Briefly Stated: February 21, 2024
Here's a look at some recent Education Week articles you may have missed.
8 min read
Education Briefly Stated: February 7, 2024
Here's a look at some recent Education Week articles you may have missed.
8 min read
Education Briefly Stated: January 31, 2024
Here's a look at some recent Education Week articles you may have missed.
9 min read