Poverty matters in school rankings: New system reveals struggles at successful schools

Poverty is a common thread among the area’s struggling schools, but Michigan’s new accountability system revealed weaknesses at buildings that passed the old system with flying colors.

Case in point: Quincy Middle School.
That rural Branch County school has never appeared on a state watch list for poor student achievement. Every year, it has hit the state’s “adequate yearly progress” benchmarks for the share of students who test proficient or better on state tests.


But for the 2011-12 school year, the first time schools were held accountable to a new system allowed by a federal waiver to the federal No Child Left Behind Act, Quincy Middle School was among 12 local buildings on the state’s list of “focus schools.”

Focus schools are those with wide gaps between the test scores of their highest- and lowest-performing students, regardless of race or income.


http://www.battlecreekenquirer.com/article/20120812/NEWS01/308120017/Poverty-matters-school-rankings

Criticism Grows As Check Cashers Expand Services in Poorer Areas

Behind bulletproof glass, a smiling teller at a Rite Check store in the South Bronx waited patiently for customers to hand over their checks. For every $100 cashed, she collected a $1.91 service fee.

Bills to pay? She handled that, too, for $1 per bill.

“Anything else, honey?” she asked one of her regulars. “O.K., have a nice day.”

Many of New York City’s poorest residents do not have bank accounts, so these window transactions, repeated hundreds of times every day, are their primary contact with the financial system. Check cashers are as familiar to them as corner bodegas, and as reliable.

But an industry built on mutual convenience has come under increased scrutiny over the past decade as its stores have continued to become full financial centers, improving services like electronic bill payment, wire transfers and prepaid debit cards.

The expansion has spurred renewed criticism from advocates for poor residents and from bank officials, who say the check-cashing industry takes advantage of those who have no other options, and it has prompted more calls for consumer protections.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/06/nyregion/as-check-cashers-expand-services-in-poorer-areas-criticism-grows.html

NPR: How America's Losing The War On Poverty

While President Obama and Gov. Romney battle for the hearts and minds of the middle class this election season, there's a huge swath of Americans that are largely ignored. It's the poor, and their ranks are growing.

According to a recent survey by The Associated Press, the number of Americans living at or below the poverty line will reach its highest point since President Johnson made his famous declaration of war on poverty in 1964.

Close to 16 percent of Americans now live at or below the poverty line. For a family of four, that's 23,000 a year. On top of that, 100 million of us — one out of three Americans — manage to survive on a household income barely twice that amount. How is this poverty crisis happening?

http://www.npr.org/2012/08/04/158141728/how-americas-losing-the-war-on-poverty

Homeless Camps in West Michigan

It's not the nicest home at "North Camp" -- a settlement of homeless shanties that has grown in recent years. 

That honor goes to Cookie's place, just down the way. But Gary Owczarzak and Cookie still live on the same side of the tracks. 

"He's got a mailbox down there," said Gary Owczarzak, a resident of this homeless camp in the city of Walker. 

He's pointing down the railroad tracks, toward the home of a homeless man known as Cookie. 

North Camp:homeless shanties in Walker

Demand climbing for women in science, engineering, math fields

Like something out of a movie or crime drama, Kailey Doherty studied the DNA strand, looking for a possible match.

The 17 year old was trying to catch a killer.

OK, not a real killer. But the lab simulation did use real DNA, and the teenage girls gathered at Kettering University were using the same techniques put to work to solve high-profile cases across the country.

If they keep up the hard work, they'll have their pick of real jobs solving cases.

Or building bridges, or writing computer algorithms, or designing artificial elbows.

Employers are more interested than ever in recruiting women into science, technology, engineering and math fields, said officials and professors at Kettering. The challenge is finding young girls who have interest in these subjects, and convincing them that it's a viable career path to explore.

http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2012/07/not_just_a_boys_club_demand_cl.html#incart_river_default

Program aims to bring local produce into low-income homes

Randi Dale and her 15-year-old daughter walked away from the farmers market in Battle Creek on Wednesday with bags full of locally-grown corn, cantaloupe, peaches and cucumbers.

But instead of cash, the Battle Creek resident made her purchase with a different type of currency — tokens, provided by the Double Up Food Bucks (DUFB) program.
“It helps me in so many ways,” Dale said. “It allows my kids and my family to eat healthy.”

When customers use their Bridge Card to shop at participating farmers markets, they receive an equal amount of up to $20 of their purchase in DUFB tokens. The tokens can then be used to buy Michigan-grown produce at the market.


Much of the program, which runs from June to November, is funded by community foundations and state government agencies.

http://www.battlecreekenquirer.com/article/20120721/NEWS01/307220001/Program-aims-bring-local-produce-into-low-income-homes

Kalamazoo-area's high-poverty schools get high grades in Mackinac Center study

There's not many studies on school quality that give Loy Norrix High School an "A" and Schoolcraft High School a "D."

But that's the results of a statewide analysis by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, a Midland-based (conservative) think-tank.

The study aims to create an more accurate apples-to-apples comparison of school performance by using a regression analysis that compares test scores to the percentage of students participating in the federal subsidized lunch program.

"Comparing a school's standardized test scores to those of other schools is one approach to measuring effectiveness, but a major objection to this method is that students' test scores tend to be relative to students' socioeconomic status -- family household income, for example, or parents' educational background," said the study. "These factors, however, are outside a school's control.

"... This disparity is a major -- and legitimate -- reason many people resist the idea of comparing schools solely on test scores," the study says. "One school may outperform another simply because its student population has a higher average socioeconomic status, not because the school is better at educating students. With this report card, we adjust the performance of a school's student on standardized tests to recognize the school's socioeconomic disadvantages."

http://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/index.ssf/2012/07/kalamazoo-areas_high-poverty_s.html

Michigan to help migrant workers left without summer housing due to devastated fruit crop

As farmers deal with a severely damaged fruit crop this year, the migrant workers who rely on the harvest for a living are struggling to find summer housing.

Many migrant workers and their families stay on grower-provided housing facilities, or camps. Farmers often provide the lodging for free or low-cost. They allow workers to stay at the orchards even after they’ve moved on to harvest vegetables and other crops, because they want to attract workers when needed.

This year is different, with a level of fruit crop devastation not seen since the 1940s. Many growers aren’t opening their camps this season, leaving migrants in a difficult situation.

http://www.mlive.com/business/index.ssf/2012/07/devastated_fruit_crop_has_left.html#incart_river_default

Struggling Families Lift Themselves Out Of Poverty

A new program in California, created the Family Independence Initiative, a nonprofit .... Its purpose is to encourage low-income families to form small groups and help each other figure out how to get ahead.


The families meet monthly and keep journals, charting their progress on income, savings, education — all the signposts of a successful life. For this, each family gets a laptop computer and an average monthly stipend of $160. The key is that the families also get to set their own goals.

One group, which met on a recent Saturday morning in San Francisco, calls itself the Fitness Five — five lively, sometimes boisterous, women. Hospital worker Shanna Chaney says their main focus is getting healthy. After all, it's hard to get ahead if you're ill.

"We all care about health — spiritual heath, everything," she says.

"Especially me," chimes in fellow group member Yovanda Dixon, "because I'm a diabetic."

http://www.npr.org/2012/07/13/155103662/struggling-families-lift-themselves-out-of-poverty

Why Churches Alone Cannot Solve the Problem of Poverty

The Hartford Institute for Religion and Research estimates there are 335,000 religious congregations in the United States. If the (U.S.) House’s proposals to cut SNAP by $133.5 billion and $36 billion are enacted, each congregation will have to spend about $50,000 more annually to feed those who would see a reduction or loss of benefits. The message from the House is that every church in America—no matter what size the congregation—must come up with an extra $50,000 to feed people every year for the next 10 years to make up for these cuts. Churches do amazing work in their communities to meet the needs of the vulnerable. However, without the help of government programs, this responsibility would be too much for religious organizations to bear. It just doesn’t add up.


http://religionandpolitics.org/2012/06/04/churches-need-strong-federal-programs-to-help-the-vulnerable/