Children whose parents did not graduate from high school and who are poor enter kindergarten less prepared than pupils without those risk factors, and they trail other students academically through 3rd grade, according to a special section in the National Center for Education Statistics’ annual digest of school data.
The data show students with both family-income and education-risk factors performed consistently worse in reading and math than those with fewer or no risk factors. Of students with one risk factor, those whose parents had less education performed slightly worse than those who were poor.
The Condition of Education provides data on public and private school students, teachers, and schools, from trends in enrollment to achievement.
