Enemy of Education: Poverty
This is the story of how I believe our great state of Idaho can have better educational outcomes for the money that we invest. It is the story about how poverty limits the ability of youth to succeed in a quickly changing economy. Unfortunately, it's the true story of the high level of poverty among Idaho's children.
The "Don't Fail Idaho" campaign aspires to successful educational investments as well. They seek: "To inspire an informed and productive conversation about education ... A brighter future should be available to every child in Idaho, regardless of zip code, race or income." I agree, and ask all interested parties to study poverty as it lowers educational outcomes, life long health and wellbeing.
Extensive research on the relationships between poverty and education is now available. The title of the recently published article from The American Academy of Pediatrics really sums up our story, "The Lifelong Effects of Early Childhood Adversity and Toxic Stress." In their opening paragraph the authors state, "Interventions to reduce adversity are very likely to strengthen physical and mental health which would generate lager returns to all of society, as compared to only educational objectives." These interventions would target reducing the problems parents suffer with job insecurity, poverty and low wages, and related violence to women and drug abuse, to name a few. They define a new term called "toxic stress" which is defined as any stress that a child faces that is ongoing and not buffered by supportive adult relationships." They document permanent structural brain changes induced by living under such stresses. In short, stressed kids lose their ability to contribute to a thriving Idaho in ways that educators cannot remedy by themselves.
Other research clearly shows that poverty and inequality of incomes is a powerful promoter of "toxic stress" in children's lives. The research proving that poverty and inequality are actual causes of social problems not the other way around is robust. In other words, "bad heredity" has increasingly been shown to NOT be the direct cause of poor educational outcomes, nor are poor teaching techniques. The causes may be much more fundamental to how we govern our society as a whole, which has led to the highest levels of childhood poverty in the industrialized world. In the end, the expenses of investing in the prevention of poverty and income inequality will certainly be cheaper than paying for the unfortunate outcomes for our youth in Idaho.
If you would like to be further educated on all of these findings, my wife and I will be speaking March 24 at NIC at 7 p.m. in Molstead Library.
Dr. Rolf Nesse is a local family physician.