Growing an Achievement Gap

By Gerald W. Bracey

The Bush administration has claimed lately that rising test scores and a narrowing black-white test-score gap reflect the success of the federal No Child Left Behind Act. Even if this is true—and it is not at all clear that it is—the achievement gap, broadly conceived, is growing. Let me explain.

I recently visited an elementary school in Fairfax County, Va. Although Fairfax County is generally affluent, the homes in this neighborhood are modest by any standard. The parents are workers—in food services, in dry cleaning, in construction, in lawn care. The school contains students from 40 nations, and its ethnic makeup is 39 percent Hispanic, 32 percent Asian, 6 percent black, 18 percent white, and 5 percent “other.” More than half don’t speak English well, half qualify for free or reduced-price meals, and the school’s mobility rate is double that of the...