Schools in Crisis by Barna Group

Author:Barna Group
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2013-12-01T00:00:00+00:00

It’s About the Economy

The education crisis is felt deeply by the single mom who can’t afford to send her kids to a private school, the parents who have no choice but to send their son off every day to high school troubled with violence, and the child who has dreams of becoming a violinist but with no public resources that enable her to follow that dream.

The impact of our schools in crisis is felt deeply at an individual level. But its effects don’t stop at an individual or a family. Poor education has a ripple effect that extends to the community, the nation, and the world.

Let’s look at the economics of the achievement gap between student demographics. An undereducated population profoundly impacts our nation’s productivity and global competitiveness today. The facts are clear:

• If the United States had closed the gap between its educational achievement levels and those of better-performing nations such as Finland and Korea, GDP in 2008 could have been $1.3 trillion to $2.3 trillion higher. This represents 9 to 16% of GDP.

• If the gap between black and Latino student performance and white student performance had been similarly narrowed, GDP in 2008 would have been between $310 billion and $525 billion higher, or 2 to 4% of GDP.

• If the gap between low-income students and the rest had been similarly narrowed, GDP in 2008 would have been $400 billion to $670 billion higher, or 3 to 5% of GDP.7

For these reasons — ​helping all children reach their God-given purpose, ensuring we have a literate nation of critical thinkers, and securing the future economic stability of our country — ​public educational inequity impacts all of us.

My Brother and Sister’s Keeper

Raise Your Voice for Public Educational Equity

Even though evangelicals believe our nation’s public schools are headed in the wrong direction, many of us are conflicted about how we should engage this problem — ​and if we should even engage it at all.

Among Christians, the most common response to the problem is a personal solution to the public school crisis. An overwhelming majority of Christians would prefer to send their children to private religious schools if given the opportunity.

Only 6% of Americans who attend church regularly send their children to religious schools, but 47% say they would prefer to send their children to religious schools if they could, followed by a combined 28% who would choose homeschooling, private schools, or charter schools. Conversely, while 84% of churchgoing parents send their children to public schools, only 24% say that is their first choice.

These gaps between parental preferences and reality are massive. In comparison, 40% of people who don’t attend church regularly say public schools are their first choice.

If we people of faith so strongly prefer to send our own children to religious schools, why aren’t we equally as motivated to help improve the very public schools we perceive are failing?

I believe it is because we struggle to reconcile two seemingly conflicting ideas: (1) America’s public schools are woefully underserving our nation’s

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