Closing Educational Gaps: It May Be Just a Matter of Time
The opportunities for low socioeconomic students currently in our K-12 system to become affluent adults may be smaller today than they were 30 years ago. The lack of political discourse on this issue and the absence of comprehensive plans from the two presidential candidates is concerning. The post-pandemic K-12 landscape in the United States has two significant challenges: learning loss and chronic - absenteeism. Addressing these issues effectively has proven difficult because many policymakers and scholars have argued discussion of persistent achievement gaps perpetuates harm. Rather than casting blame, we have the tools and data to take an empirical approach to understanding the factors that statistically explain these disparities among different groups of students.
One critical factor that has been overlooked for years is how children allocate their time from birth to age 18. Economists, such as Michael Keane and Kenneth Wolpin, have long argued that this factor is the most important determinant of career outcomes.
Demographic student achievement data on the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP), Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), and American College Test (ACT), provide data on several ethnic groups: Asian Americans, White Americans, Hispanic Americans, and African Americans. Asian Americans are performing the best out of all racial groups on these assessments. We need to consider why.
The Homework Gap, a study from the Brookings Institute in 2017, documented substantial differences in time allocated to homework outside of school by race and economics, for a sample of high school students. The study found Asian Americans spent an average of 115 minutes per day on homework, compared with 60 minutes among White Americans, 40-45 minutes among Hispanic Americans, and 30-35 minutes among African Americans. Multiply these minutes by 365 days per year over the 4 years a child spends in high school and the gaps in learning time speak for themselves.
The natural question is what drives these differences in the allocation of time towards homework (and other afterschool programming activities). The home environment a child lives in from birth to 18 directly correlates to the amount of quality adult time they receive and the educational activities they get exposed to based on the resources their parents have. A mountain of empirical research has now emerged showing that a two-parent home confers major benefits to children, most recently with Melissa Kearney’s publication of The Two-Parent Privilege and Harvard economist, Raj Chetty’s.most recent study on upward mobility.
When we look at the data, 88% of Asian American children are raised in a two-parent home, compared to 77% among White Americans, 62% among Hispanic Americans, and 38% among African Americans. Compare these numbers with time on homework and this ironically correlates to educational outcomes from each group on national assessments. Based on this reality, we need to ask the following: Are schools alone able to address the time gap? Are we targeting our education policy in the right areas? What additional things are necessary to solve these gaps?
First, are schools alone able to address the time gap? According to The Parent Trap, children from birth to 18 spend only roughly 10% of their time in school. Based on this information, the answer is absolutely not. The 90% of the time a child spends outside of school, particularly from birth to age 5, have more to do with a child’s success than the 10% of the time they spend in school. Expecting schools to solve this problem alone is beyond ludicrous.
Are we targeting our education policy in the right areas? In our book, The Economics of Equity my colleague and I lay out a number of interventions necessary to fill in the gap of quality educational time for low socioeconomic students where Hispanic and African Americans are disproportionately represented. These interventions include more equitable technology access, effective parental involvement strategies for single-parent homes, how to implement more effective quality out-of-school time programs, strategies to get the most effective teachers in front of the neediest children, and the need for more choice among schools that have the flexibility to readily serve students on the low end of the time gap.
What additional things are necessary to solve these gaps? The data schools receive on students, including race, gender, class, learning disabilities, and English Language Learners, have produced policy and programming centered around Diversity Equity and Inclusion arguments as to why the so-called culturally-biased tests should be eliminated, and discussion regarding the implementation of new types of math based on culture that have been investigated as possible ways to improve these gaps. These programs, more than likely, will not produce positive results on a large scale because they don’t provide children on the low end of the gap with more educational time. Giving school decision-makers information on a student's family structure may give them more meaningful information that they can use to target students in need of school and community interventions to close the educational time gap.
In summary, it is crucial for policymakers to take this issue more seriously in order to develop effective solutions. Agendas and ideological standoffs will not lead to progress. Implementing effective programs, such as holding schools accountable for attendance rates and demonstrating student growth in literacy and math, may compel school systems to integrate the previously mentioned strategies to address the time gap.
