Research That Benefits Children and Familes- an Uplifting Story

As everyone knows by now, my topic of research is closing the academic achievement gap by specifically discovering those methods or and practices that are most effective in preventing and or closing the gap between poor school age children and their wealthier counterparts. There are various theories about how and why such large gaps in performance exist among student groups. The traditional thinking is that the gap exist primarily because of poor teacher quality, underfunded schools and overcrowding to name of few. However, before serving in my current role as a community and parent outreach coordinator, I served as a behavioral health specialist with Children’s Crisis Treatment Center in Philadelphia PA. And what I learned in this role is that the source of this problem does that lay exclusively with the issues mentioned above, but is in large part are due to what has been termed, early childhood trauma.
Now when we think of trauma we usually think of one isolated event that causes significant psychological and or physical stress or harm. However, I would propose that trauma doesn’t have to be a single event, but something that is prolonged like, poverty. Research has consistently shown that ongoing exposure to economic stress and hardship harms child development: parents invest less in their kids and experience higher levels of stress (Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2014.). Furthermore, low family income can impede children’s cognitive development and their ability to learn and it also contributes to behavioral, social and emotional problems (Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2014). The ability for a child to regulate his or her behavior and or emotions is one of the building blocks needed for learning and school success.

That being said, if I could do a research project that would make a major positive contribution to the well-being of children or their families, it would be around the topic of how to mitigate the impacts of long term poverty on children during their sensitive period of growth. I would specially want to know what supports would be most effective in helping parent(s) engage their children around those activities, such as reading, simulation activities and  the use of developmental toys and materials, that we know prepare children, regardless of their backgrounds, for success in school and in life.

This research would contribute to those best practices that we know help to close and or prevent achievement gaps between the haves and have nots. Families would be healthier, which would lead to healthier communities and schools. The ultimate impact would be on society in the increase of productivity because the children of the parents involved in my research project would have gone on to  move out of poverty and become successful contributing members of society.

                                                                Reference

The Annie  E. Casey Foundation. (n.d.) The Consequences of Poverty for Children Retrieved from http://www.aecf.org

My Personal Research Journey

The general topic I have chosen to do my research simulation on is the academic achievement gap.  The subtopic of this larger research area I have decided to focus in on specifically is; what preventive methods are the most promising in closing the achievement gap and or preventing it all together among preschoolers?  I have chosen this topic for very personal reasons.  I shared in detail in one of my application assignments the following:

Uvieghara (2014) asserted personally, “I am drawn to this issue for many reasons. First, as a primary student I struggled immensely in school.  I started school behind and struggled to catch up with my peers for most of my primary and secondary education.  I was held back twice because of poor reading and math comprehension.  It was in many cases a miracle that I was able to graduate and go on to college.  It was then that I began a personal journey of sorts to discover why I had such a difficult time in school initially.  I also wanted to know how pervasive was my experience with that of other children that came from a similar backgrounds as mine” (p. 1).

It was in 2010, while as a Public Ally through Americore that I had the opportunity to start to begin to understand why I struggled early in my academic career.   In my role as a Public Ally I interned with an urban education reform organization called A+Schools.  I learned for the first time about the academic achievement gap and what I discovered was revealing to say the least.  I initially thought that the achievement gap was due to built in inequalities within the public school system; such as poorly funded public schools, teacher quality, overcrowding etc.  However, upon further research I discovered that while these issues contributed to the gap there was more to the story, because what I found was that the gap was observed upon entry into kindergarten.  After doing some more in-depth research I learned that the reason for such gaps upon entry into kindergarten had a lot to do with the environments children were coming from and the quality of early care and education they received.  To make a long story short, these finding prompted me to take up a profession in early childhood development with the goal of closing the academic achievement gap in my lifetime.

As far my personal experiences goes as it relates to this research simulation, I would say it has been exciting yet daunting.  I am excited because I have been given the opportunity to research a topic that is so near and dear to me, one that I have longed to do a more in-depth study on. Nonetheless, since I have never done research in my entire academic career I am a little overwhelmed with the process so far. There’s a lot to learn as far as conducting appropriate research and what I have found too, is that many of the scholarly articles are difficult to understand and really require a lot of time to sift through before I have gained a good grasp of the information. This was my experience with the research chart assignment anyway; but I am hopeful that as I move forward it will get easier!  Something tells me, however, that this is wishful thinking! lol  That said,  for those of you who have some experience with research if you wouldn’t mind sharing some tips that would help make this research journey more enjoyable please feel free to do so!

Reference

Uvieghara, K. (2014) Building Research Competences. Unpublished Manuscript. Walden University