A Response to "It's Not All About Class Size"

Some blog readers may be interested in a recent post [Hake (2009] with the above title. The abstract reads:

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Stephen Ceci and Spryos Konstantopoulos in a "Chronicle of Higher Education" commentary "It's Not All About Class Size" point out that the new administration needs to be aware that attempts to fulfill its pledge to narrow the *international* achievement gap between America and it international competitors by reforms such a decreasing class sizes might thereby widen the *domestic* achievement gap that separates black and white, rich and poor. But, in my opinion, the new administration also needs to be aware that a major cause of the domestic achievement gap is POVERTY, as forcefully argued by David Berliner. I submit that: (a) reduction of poverty in the U.S. might reduce *both* the domestic and international achievement gaps, since then the learning of *all* students, not just the advantaged, would be markedly increased by reforms such a reduction in class size, more effective teachers, and more effective pedagogy; (b) a more important reason for increasing student learning than narrowing the international achievement gap is the need to alleviate the science/math illiteracy of the general population and thereby lessen the threat to life on planet Earth.
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To access the entire post please click on http://tinyurl.com/daf85y .

REFERENCES
Hake, R.R. 2009. "A Response to 'It's Not All About Class Size', " AERA-L post of 6 February 2009 09:42:04-0800; online at http://tinyurl.com/daf85y .