New study shows there’s no such thing as a lost cause when it comes to education

It’s never too late to help a struggling student. An amazing new study conducted by the University of Chicago’s Urban Education Lab shows that intense tutoring combined with group behavioral counseling can help high school students with weak math skills, chronic truancy and disciplinary problems improve their performance. The study showed impressive gains. In fact,...

It’s never too late to help a struggling student.

An amazing new study conducted by the University of Chicago’s Urban Education Lab shows that intense tutoring combined with group behavioral counseling can help high school students with weak math skills, chronic truancy and disciplinary problems improve their performance.

The study showed impressive gains. In fact, over an eight-month period, the 106 Chicago teenagers involved in the study learned the equivalent of what the average American high-school student learns in math during three years of school. They were also far more likely to meet indicators of being on track to graduate from high school on time.

This new research flies in the face of people who, as head researcher Professor Ludwig put it, “are convinced that results like this aren’t possible at all for disadvantaged teens […] more and more people are of the view that you’ve got to reach poor kids by age 6, or it’s too late and the effects on entrenched poverty are already too profound.”

Unfortunately, many of these people head teachers unions across the state. They routinely use impoverished students as scapegoats for why outcomes at the state’s lowest-performing schools aren’t improving.

Here’s a direct quote from Karen Lewis – president of the Chicago Teachers Union – from a speech she gave to the City Club of Chicago in late 2012:

“We cannot fix what’s wrong with our schools until we are prepared to have honest conversations about poverty and race […] Until we do, we will be mired in the no-excuses mentality [that] poverty doesn’t matter. Poverty matters a lot when you are teaching children who are distracted by their lives. Poverty matters a lot when you are teaching children who have seen trauma like none of us in this room can imagine.”

There’s some other good news: the tutoring and counseling services only cost $4,400 per student. While this might seem expensive at first glance, the financial benefit of students graduating on time and finding employment or going to college more than justifies the expense.

Just look at the average annual earning of drop-outs: $21,080, compared to college graduates who earn $50,734 on average.  The increase in tax revenue alone will cover the cost.

This study shows what education reformers have believed all along: that students who are two, three or even five grade levels behind are not lost causes. With the right help, they can succeed.

Illinois legislators should keep this in mind when they hear the voices of teachers’ union bosses in Springfield claiming that little can be done to help students in Illinois’ lowest-performing schools.