School districts battle challenges of poverty in education

School districts battle challenges of poverty in education

By MICHELLE MERLIN mmerlin@record-eagle.com Jan 31, 2016

TRAVERSE CITY — There is such thing as a free lunch at Blair Elementary. And breakfast.

So many students — 90 percent a year ago — at the Grand Traverse County school qualify for the state’s free and reduced meal program that it’s provided to everyone. And while children at the school flow in and out of a special “sensory room” where they can read, squeeze together Legos and bounce on a trampoline — it’s not pure child’s play.

It’s a place to offset the toxic stress caused by poverty — a factor that can inhibit learning and development, said the school’s principal Kirsten Jones-Morgan.

She realized last year that a large number of students simply weren’t available for learning when they walked into the building because of stressors like family financial troubles and accompanying problems like substance abuse and domestic violence. Staff research found that worries about running water, heat, or somewhere to sleep at night take precedence over learning.

“Typically, you’re talking about a lack of development of those core executive functioning skills ... often the parts of our brains that control our impulses, our ability to regulate ourselves emotionally and our ability to tolerate frustration,” she said. “Our kids in a very generalized way can struggle with those three things.”

She and other local educators are now schooling themselves in how to tackle these student struggles.

A rising tide

An estimated 12 percent of students in Traverse City Area Public Schools live in poverty, according to U.S. Census Bureau 2014 estimates. That tally nearly doubled since 2000, when the number of school-aged children — ages five to 17 — living in poverty was an estimated 6.5 percent.

The number of children in poverty is even more substantial in other area school districts, including Mancelona, where about 24 percent of children live in poverty, and Benzie County’s Frankfort-Elberta district, with 27 percent.

Children living in poverty may come to their desks already behind their more affluent peers, said Dan Reardon, a Michigan Department of Education consultant who works with state and federal programs.

“The limited experiences results in limited prior knowledge so that child, that upper-middle class child comes to school with all of this knowledge that a poorer counterpart doesn’t have,” Reardon said.

TCAPS Associate Superintendent Sander Scott said in general, more social problems accompany children living in poverty than those who do not.

He saw some differences firsthand when he moved from being the principal at Interlochen Community School, where at the time more than half the students received free and reduced lunch, to Westwoods Elementary School, which had fewer than 15 percent of students in that category. He said the differences are immediately visible, because children from affluent backgrounds tend to come to school already knowing their letters and sounds. Children from disadvantaged backgrounds might not have that knowledge before they come to school.

Scott likened the difference to building a house: the framework has to be there before drywall can be installed.

“Often we find kids from impoverished households, we have to put the frame in,” he said.

Scott said the reasons for poverty and the problems associated with it can vary from anything like parents with drug and alcohol addictions to homelessness to parents who work two or three jobs.

“And yet the challenges for the kids remain the same in a lot of ways,” he said.

Schools receive money based on the number of students eligible for free and reduced lunch. He said the district tries to help by putting more social workers in schools with more at-risk and poor children.

Support for parents and students

Michelle Bridges attended the parent support group after one of Blair Elementary’s social workers encouraged her to go and learn how to support her 10-year-old son.

Bridges also has two daughters, ages 7 and 2, and quit working when her youngest daughter was 3 months old. She said somewhere between $20 to $25 per day for child care for each child offset any financial benefit from her working. Money was tight, and shortly after Bridges stopped working, she moved across town. She was unable to get her son to school because gas prices were too high for her to afford.

Her husband is a farm hand who was recently placed on salary, a change that helps the family financially because there’s more work for him during the summer, she said.

Bridges initially didn’t want to talk to the school about the family’s financial struggles. But things changed one day her daughter was caught stealing snacks from other students and offered an explanation: she was hungry.

Even though Bridges was hesitant to trust the school staff with her problems and didn’t want anyone to judge her for them, she grew to change. Now, she realizes other parents are in a tight spot too.

“I don’t feel so alone on it,” she said. Her advice for other parents who struggle to make ends meet: don’t be afraid to ask for help.

“After they started to see what was going on and offered their help, I learned to trust them and put faith in their ability when I need it,” she said.

The Reed family is more financially comfortable, but they took advantage of some of the services offered at Blair for their fifth-grade son’s special needs. He experienced severe trauma before they adopted him, and the family work closely with Blair staff. Isaiah’s development is delayed and he suffers from post-traumatic stress and other problems. Whenever he’s having a rough morning, the Reeds contact the school and someone checks in with Isaiah.

“We work together — it’s not just on them and it’s not just on us,” Betty Reed said. “It’s called teamwork and you’ve got to have it.”

Teachers, social workers and other staff at Blair try to meet the challenges starting before long before the bell rings to start school each day. They greet students at the door and try to gauge what kind of day they’re having. Jones-Morgan calls it a “soft landing” — a chance for teachers and staff to get a sense of what the day will be like, and for children to decompress before the day starts.

The daily schedule accommodates students who need additional help with minimum disruption, and a new reading curriculum was selected to serve the school’s population.

The more direct curriculum starts in kindergarten, where students learn to associate letter shapes with the sounds they make. The name of the letter doesn’t initially enter into the equation.

The school also has additional support staff, including social workers and a literacy teacher. School officials also recently partnered with Grand Traverse Pie Company to start a group aimed at helping parents in difficult situations. Attending parents are provided with free child care, a gas voucher, and meal for attending.

The efforts appear to be paying off, according to preliminary testing, which showed students grew more from the fall to winter this year than last. The most striking change was in first graders, who grew two points last year and 11.4 this year. Discipline referrals also decreased by 71 percent from September to December last year compared to 2015.

Scott said he avoids making generalizations about student success based on their socioeconomic status — not all students in poverty struggle, and not all students from affluent backgrounds succeed. But taking action in impoverished areas can foster opportunity.

“It doesn’t feel right to make these sweeping generalizations, but it is the work we need to do to provide these kids that are coming from this disadvantaged background to try to even the playing field for them so they’ve got a shot at the American dream,” Scott said.

Jones-Morgan, who started her career as a school social worker, hopes the effort has long-term impacts.

“I’ve spent a career really trying to be a force for equality and equity, and so being able to work in a building where if we’re successful, if we can actually pull off what we intend, we’re assisting to help change the trajectory of their lives.”

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