On Top of the News
In Rust Belt, a Teenager’s Climb from Poverty
Washington Post | 12/9/2012

Behind the Headline
Belmont and Fishtown Part Ways
Education Next | Winter 2013

In a long article in the Washington Post, Anne Hull follows a poor teenager in a small Rust-Belt town who wants to attend college and break the cycle of poverty. The teen keeps busy with work and activities; schoolwork plays a very small part in her focused effort to escape to a better life. Hull writes

She rarely brought work home. Some of her teachers used class time to let students complete their assignments. If Tabi had extra homework, she blew through it at lunch. Even so, she maintained a 3.0 GPA while taking honors courses.

In the Winter 2013 issue of Ed Next, Nathan Glazer reviewed Charles Murray’s latest book, Coming Apart, which examined the decline of white, working-class American communities like the one that serves as the backdrop of the Washington Post story. In the review, Glazer wondered what role schools could play in helping turn things around.

-Education Next