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Mission:
Mitigating the “achievement gap” that exists between ethnic minority children and their majority peers is a significant and complex challenge to educational, health, and social services in America. We aim to mount an attack on the achievement gap with a) a comprehensive, interdisciplinary array of R&D of national significance, and targeted interventions designed to reduce the achievement gap in Philadelphia.

Background:
Defined narrowly, the achievement gap is the difference in K-12 academic achievement between underrepresented minority schoolchildren and their majority peers. Defined more broadly, it is the difference in access to opportunities experienced by members of certain groups. The gap is persistent and has resisted efforts to eradicate it over several decades. It is also important, both because of the social injustices it represents and because of the social costs it carries (e.g. potential contributions lost and extra social services required).

We don’t fully understand the causes of the achievement gap, but we know that they are many and interrelated.  The influences on a child’s academic achievement include, for example, her physical health and psycho-social well-being, her parents’ support of academic achievement, the preparedness of her teachers, the resources of her school, the quality and cultural relevance of the curriculum she studies.  Each of these influences plays on the others in various ways, and all of it within a policy and social context that shapes (and is shaped by) her experiences.  So understanding and acting effectively against the gap means drawing on expertise from across academic disciplines and, ideally, partnering with social institutions in places where the gap is present. We believe that Penn is ideal for taking on this mission because of our history of working across school and disciplinary boundaries, and because of the long-standing commitment we have to improving education and social services in Philadelphia.

Goals:
We aim to see a proliferation of achievement gap-related R&D at Penn that is nationally significant, and to mount a concerted attack on the achievement gap in Philadelphia.  There is important gap-relevant work already being done at Penn that takes place mostly in isolated pockets, so another outcome of this initiative is to give extant work greater visibility and to present it as part of a larger Penn capacity.  Over the next several months, starting at our February 20 meeting, we will develop a conceptual and practical vision for accomplishing this goal and begin the work.