User:TheAlexRodriguez/Neighbourhood effect

The Neighborhood Effect on Education in the United States (section that will be added)

The neighborhood effect on education is an implicit practice where people from different neighborhoods receive different educational resources in local schooling which impacts academic achievements such as test scores, grade point averages, and professional connections due to the neighborhood's wealth. This practice allows students who live in richer (more affluent) neighborhoods to receive higher quality teachers, programs, clubs, faculty, and campus environment due to the wealth of the local schooling institution, and vice versa.

Definition

The neighborhood effect on education is a practice which affects individual educational outcome based on the individuals' surrounding neighborhood's quality and characteristics. In multiple studies examining the role of one's neighborhood, it was founded that the characteristics of "neighborhood poverty, a poor educational climate, the proportion of ethnic/migrant groups, and social disorganization" all contribute to the lack of academic succession amongst students living within these neighborhoods. A neighborhood's poverty contributes to the lack of resources students might receive, poor educational climate include lack of adequate and trained teachers in these schools, and the high proportion of ethnic groups in the social disorganized communities translates into lack of mentors to voice the importance of education to individuals in their communities. In all, one's community determines the academic experience an individual might face.

History

This practice is rooted in how the public education system is funded in the United States of America. The U.S constitution grants the power of education to the States which allows the States to decide how to fund and allocate money to their education system(s). Due to this power, the issue of the neighborhood effect on education was created as the States have traditionally allowed for local property taxes to fund most of the public education system within the school districts creating large disparities. With studies taken in all 50 states, it was observed that nearly half of the budget of the education system comes out of local property taxes which generates large amount on inequalities within high poverty neighborhoods and districts. Communities that have higher property tax value -- meaning, more expensive and valuable properties such as houses -- can provide more funding and resources to local schools vis a vis other low-income communities that can provide less due to their surrounding property tax value.

Although the origins of this practice cannot be traced, the effect is felt by many many low-income students and their communities. The issue of the neighborhood effect in general was first made popular in academia by an english author, William Julius Wilson in 1987, in Wilson’s book “The Truly Disadvantaged”. In this book, Wilson talks about realities of one's neighborhood impacting one’s “outcomes, such as economic self-sufficiency, violence, drug use, low birthweight, cognitive ability, and education ”, and sheds light on the issues of the urban ghetto that purports inequality and poverty. Wilson's book to many scholars and activists is seen as the "bible" of scholarship regarding the neighborhood effect which even influenced President Obama to sign a $840-billion stimulus bill to assist poor inner cities with money for schools, cops, homelessness. This book has been the stepping stone to many researchers to conduct studies in cities and scholars writing about the need to address the implicit practices and impacts of one's neighborhoods ever since the release of Wilson's book in 1987.

Impact

Students that attend schooling institutions in low-income areas are subjugated to fewer resources, such as fewer and cheaper interactive classroom materials, such as TVs, high-speed internet, and functioning laptops, consistently present teachers, enrichment programs, such as dance, theatre arts, and choir, and less tutoring programs that can assist with standardized testing. This happens because low-income, high poverty areas make less money in their surrounding property taxes which means less money to give the local schools to provide for those aforementioned resources. It is noted today that the highest-poverty districts receive about $2,000, or 16 percent, less per student than low-poverty, affluent districts. On the other hand, the schools and school districts in more affluent communities that get more money based on local property taxes, receive more quality teachers due to being able to provide higher wages, less crime presence and rates within schools, and more enrichment, college-ready programs that can greatly increase higher academic standardized testing scores and retention rates in schools.

A study was done in the inner-city of New York to prove the effect neighborhood affluence had on people's education and life as a whole. In New York City, students were moved from high-poverty areas into low-poverty areas under the Moving to Opportunity for Housing Demonstration (MTO) project. As noted by this project survey, these students who were moved into more affluent areas were those that had positive increases in their achievement scores measured by standardized tests. Implicitly found within these findings is the fact that students who are in high-poverty neighborhoods are those that lack proper school counselors, up-to-date textbooks, enrichment programs, school safety, and consistently present teachers. These students also lack people within their communities that can serve as a positive role model to enforce the importance of education. Lastly, students in low-income/high poverty communities are exposed to other realities such as crime, gang violence, high teen pregnancy rates, and lack of adequate transportation which can all hinder their academic succession which then creates larger disparities between neighborhoods on standardized testing.

The difference of standardized testing and school performance between neighborhoods also creates impactful stigmas associated with low-income students in high-poverty areas. These low-income students who face other realities in their schooling institutions are seen as the blame of their academic deficiency and are often stigmatized because of that. This is in part because few policies have been enacted to help reduce the magnitude of the neighborhood effect on education to these students, such as the ineffective Obama's Neighborhood Revitalization Initiative which failed to give local schooling adequate resources to help support their students due to congressional inaction and poor allocation. Due to this bureaucracy and lack of government action, students are subjugated to lower test scores which promote a lack of self control amongst these students which can have devastating effects, such as low self-esteem, lack of hope, and depression. Students, through a study observed in local school institutions, have shown that when they receive lower test scores, which is a direct correlation to the amount of resources a school can provide, feel as they are less than others and are not in control of their lives. Thus, not only does the neighborhood effect on education impact student's test scores, but in doing so, affects the students' sense of worth and emotions as the students view their test scores as indicators of their value and command of their life.