Baltimore's students are poor, the rates arelO.2 percent in Prince George's County and 6.7 percent in Montgomery County (Miller. 1998).
Man-land ranks among states that have the largest urban achievement gaps nationally   It joins states like Michigan and New Jersey that have central cities that are isolated socially and economically (Olson & Craig, 1998). Across the nation, some states have had to pursue crucial steps to assist students in troubled districts. In states like New Jersey and Connecticut, assistance has taken the form of what some refer to as "state takeovers."   Although some would criticize ihis intervention as interference, the fact remains that by the time the states get involved, the academic situation of the students has usually gone beyond drastic.
Issue: The Impact of Poverty on Achievement
We have constructed an educational system so full of inequities that it actually exacerbates the challenges of race and poverty rather than ameliorates them. Simply put. \ve take students who have less to begin with and give them less in school too.    Education Watch: The 1996 Education Trust Stare and National Data Book
Poverty undermines achievement. To illustrate the connection between poverty- and low achievement. Olson and Jerald (1998c) cite findings of the Prospects report that was mandated by Congress. The report, based on a study of 27.000 Title I students, concludes that "school poverty depresses scores of all students in schools where at least half the children are eligible for subsidized lunch and seriously depresses the scores when more than 75 percent of students live in low income households." The study also revealed that poor students" academic performance increased when they attended middle class schools. Also, findings showed that there were schools in poor neighborhoods where students succeed well. Such findings suggest that the problem in achievement may not be due 10 the influence of poor students on schools, but to the influence of schools on poor students.
Poverty among children has risen beyond 20 percent nationally. As of 1996. the U.S. census Bureau reported that one in five children under age 18 in this country qualifies as poor. African American children live in poverty at four times the rate of White children. U.S. Census data indicates that African-American children are more likely to live in concentrated poverty, as that found in centralized cities, than children from other racial/ethnic groups. Hispanic children now make up the ethnic group most likely to live in poverty, surpassing African Americans.   Although the percentage for African American children in poverty has declined somewhat recently, the proportional poverty rates for Hispanic and African American children exceeds that of White children three-fold. By the year 2010, projections indicate that half of African American and Hispanic children will be in poverty. NCES poses that the "poor school outcomes" of African .American and Hispanic students is associated with the fact that they are more likely to be living in poverty than their White peers. Also, minorities are more likely to attend high poverty schools that generally lack the educational climates and resources of low poverty schools (Social Context. 1997).