In their book Creating the Opportunity to Learn authors Wade Boykin and Pedro Noguera discuss and examine the academic achievement gap that exists in the American educational system. Boykin, the director of the graduate program in the psychology department at Howard University and Noguera, a professor of education at the New York University state that the achievement gap can be divided into three dimensions. These dimensions are the gap between the level of education between the minority and majority, the American and European students, and he gap between the existent knowledge and the necessary knowledge for becoming successful.
Authors begin their study with a set framework for a better understanding why the book like Creating the Opportunity to Learn is written, intersecting the theories of race and education that are common in the current pedagogy practice. Furthermore, they examine the possible reasons for the achievement gap and evaluate the current studies for finding out the ways of addressing and solving the issue. According to Boykin and Noguera, “Finding ways to close (or at least reduce) the achievement gap – the disparities in test scores and academic outcomes that follow well-established patterns typically corresponding to the race and class of children – has been a national priority for nearly a decade” (6).
Moreover, Boykin and Noguera discuss the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation and state that even within the ten years of increased awareness and mandatory focus on achieving success caused by the legislation, the problems of the malperformance and the achievement gap have not been solved. Authors then suggest that while NCLB was not an absolute solution, its adoption did “constitute a radical break from the idea that the relationship between race and intelligence was immutable” (Boykin and Noguera 7).
Book Structure
Creating the Opportunity to Learn is divided into three sections. The first section provides an insightful overview for the readers that have little knowledge about the achievement gap in the country. The authors focus on the separation between the voluntary and involuntary minorities that do worse at school than the voluntary. The second section focuses on the research review, however, although there is an extensive analysis based on the level of elementary schools there was, unfortunately, no research that came from the level of high schools. The reasons for this may be the actual lack of research from the high school level that relates to the three gaps discussed in the book, or the presented analysis has some shortcomings. The third section of Creating the Opportunity to Learn was grounded on the strong idea that the interaction between the teacher and the student in the classroom is also very important. Authors state, “A substantial body of research has shown that improving the quality of instructions is the most effective way to boost student achievement” (Boykin and Noguera 187).
Target Audience
In general, Creating the Opportunity to Learn is an excellent resource for teachers and school administers as well as anyone else interested in this particular topic and the psychology of education. On the other hand, some of the strategies presented in the book may sound simple and obvious. However, they go deep into the psychology of the strategies and explain why exact strategies may work for certain situations.
Critique
I disagree with some of the points that authors mention in the book. There is a misleading claim illustrated in the book, namely, the fact that the US students do very bad in their academic achievements compared to students from other countries. If the scores are to be divided by race, then Asian and White students seem to do well compared to other countries. This suggests that the U.S. educational system works brilliantly for the specific races. The issue of the malperformance of American students is linked to the minority groups’ achievement gap. Paying extra attention to the mentioned point is necessary because of the fact that the opponents of the US educational system use aggregate numbers to over exaggerate the current state. Thus, when expanding on the topic of the U.S. educational system, one should keep in mind that the minority populations that receive less attention from the system negatively influence the average.
In Creating the Opportunity to Learn Wade Boykin and Pedro Noguera discuss the examples of school districts that are either successful it not. Their discussions suggest that in the majority of unsuccessful schools teachers blame parents for the poor success of the students. While it’s human nature to shift the blame on someone else, in reality, some schools just cannot fix every issue that contributes to poor academic achievement. Thus, the fact that authors do not pay attention to the mesosystemic factors is somewhat disappointing.
With this said, Creating the Opportunity to Learn is a rare book that provides a detailed review of the achievement gap that exists in public schools. It can be considered to a roadmap for those interested in educational psychology or the specific topic of the achievement gap.
Works Cited
Boykin, Wade, and Pedro Noguera. Creating the Opportunity to Learn: Moving from Research to Practice to Close the Achievement Gap. Alexandria, VA: ASCD, 2011. Print.