No Child Left Behind Done the Right Way

¶ … education topics of a certain flavor. Specifically, the author sought out articles about special attention and special case schools for troubled youth as well as the use of pre-kindergarten programs to give at-risk and other youth a head start before they enter the somewhat chaotic system that every other child must traverse. Put another way, the subject and articles all relate to how to improve and prepare students and thus prevent or remedy any struggles they may have before or during their schooling.

This is important because for each article, there will be a summary of the thesis and main ideas, why the source is credible, and why this source would be worthy of an argument and/or persuasive paper. While not all journal articles are of the same quality, scholarly journals are always the best and most reliable source of information when speaking of an academic and scientific process or formal research but reputable newspapers and even some periodicals can yield worthwhile nuggets and points of their own.

Analysis The first article up for review is related to student placement in alternative schools when the student in question is arguably or definitely at high risk. The article appeared in the journal Education and Urban Society and was published in 2007 by two professors at the University of Cincinnati. The article in question is a case study about said alternative schools and is meant to contribute to the greater volume of material on the subject.

A major finding of this particular treatise is that both black and white students and teachers were able to cross socioeconomic and racial lines in a form and way that is often not seen in more traditional class settings and schools. The source is credible in that it is in a reputable journal and the professors in question work for a reputable university.

It also gets points for its clear nod towards contributing to the aggregate research and material that others have and will be doing on the same or similar subjects. For that reason and several others, this source is absolutely worthy of inclusion in the author of this report's future argument/persuasive paper because it shows a clear outlier in the commonly held assumptions and beliefs about teaching and learning experience between black students and white students and between the rich and the poor.

Put another way, it would seem that the effective environment for the teachers and students can have a very positive effect on the learning process (Brown & Beckett, 2007). The second of the three articles reviewed for this report is quite similar to the first in that it relates mainly and mostly to much the same subject, that being catering and focusing on at-risk students in a multi-cultural yet socioeconomically challenged school setting. It was authored by four different people at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand.

This second article was the result of a four-year longitudinal study that focused specifically on an intermediate school that was filled with multiple cultures and people of a generally low socioeconomic level. By "intermediate," the study is referencing students at roughly the 7th and 8th grade level if compared to the United States, or basically eleven, twelve and thirteen-year-olds. The study's results revealed that certain facets and approaches to teaching yielded the most results and achievement for students and educators alike.

Those factors that seemed to be optimal included effective and collaborative school leadership, ongoing and perpetual school-wide development of faculty and staff, assessment data being used to inform and improve teaching and the appointment of a competent and observant literacy leader to improve and refine the curricula as needed. The schools that are a proverbial open book and which welcome outside third party review are typically interested in external validation and verification that they are doing things the right way or at least are moving in the right overall direction.

This work is reputable as they took great pains to spend the time and resources necessary to get exhaustive results along with a firm identification of best practices and tactics to avoid along the way.

To evaluate these topics over nearly half a decade is impressive by itself but the college engaging in the study is both international and reputable in nature and this thus would greatly improve the depth and breadth of the body of knowledge that the author of this report will use for the argument/persuasive paper that is to come (Fletcher et al., 2013). The third and final article assessed in this brief literature review dovetails greatly with the other two but itself takes on a slightly different form.

Like the other two, this third article pertains to educating and assisting at-risk children but the age group in question are children that are pre-kindergarten age but are old enough to start teaching and forming so that they do not enter kindergarten and their later years behind the levels of more affluent children or those of lower socioeconomic strata of other types such as race and geographical area. The article is actually an opinionated editorial from the New York Times.

However, there is still some worthy material in this report because some of the points made are quite illuminating and important. For example, the author notes that stark majorities of both Republicans and Democrats feel that pre-K programs are extremely beneficial and that they should be expanded. The approval rating was higher for Democrats but one of the leading states on this subject happens to be Oklahoma which is about as "red" as a state can be.

The article also notes that some of the more notoriously successful pre-K programs were actually ran and operated in the 1960's and 1970's and were known as Abecedarian and Perry Preschool. The article is reputable as it appears in the New York Times and the author, Nicholas Kristof, is a highly regarded columnist and journalist.

This article can certainly be used for the argument/persuasive paper to be authored by the author of this report as this is one of the more poignant and assertive opinions on the topic of special school situations and catering to at-risk youth. As such, it could be used as a point to contend with or it could also be.