Should Teachers Ignore Poverty's Impact?

Imagine a football coach who designs his plays with no regard to the talents of his players, half of whom are on crutches, deaf or blind. And even if they are not so handicapped, if they have no ability to catch or throw a ball, running a pass-oriented West Coast style offense will not work.

To impose an educational regime without regard to the knowledge of the students is not fair to them, and highly unlikely to be productive. Knowing something about the family background, the circumstances from which they come, is certainly, in an age when we are trying to improve the school-home relationship to be more productive in our efforts, relevant information to consider. That is not to write off any student, but rather to adjust our instruction to meet the student where s/he is.

We will still try to raise that student as far as we can. Just as I would no more attempt to teach algebra to a student who lacks basic arithmetic or offer the third year of foreign language instruction to a student who has yet to pass the first year, why should I be expected to pretend that there is no information to be gained from knowing the family background of the student, and then be surprised when my middle-class experience of a family's ability to help with school work, or even to support the efforts of the school, is missing? What if that student lacks a safe or quiet place in which to do school work? What if that student comes to school without dinner or breakfast on a regular basis, or is being abused? All of this is critical to the well-being of the child even as it is critical to the academic expectations we place on that student.

That is why I call every family at the start of the year, why I attempt to get to know my students as people. What happens in my classroom is inevitably going to be affected by the life of the student in the 23 hours and 15 minutes outside my classroom and on the days I do not see her.

**

Paul Hill, director of the Center on Reinventing Public Education at the University of Washington:

A school or teacher group should be able to follow a tightly defined vision of a good teacher, or a good teaching method. That doesn't mean there is no place for people with other views or approaches. There might be schools that would hire someone with this person's views in an instant and would not like to bring in a "no excuses" type.

Coherency and consistency work, and they should trump any teacher or administrator's right to be different.

This person subscribes to the dominant public education ideology, which is that any point of view sincerely held is as good as any other. That might be true in the grand scheme of morality but it plays hell with an organization's effectiveness.

It is annoying not to be picked for the team but she is lucky they didn't let her in and let her find out how miserable she would be.

**

Mark Simon, national coordinator, Mooney Institute for Teacher and Union Leadership, Washington D.C.: