The numbers in the table above clearly show that Lawrence is a lower income community with a large, predominantly Spanish speaking population of high school age teenagers. Andover on the other hand is a relatively affluent mainstream community. The Andover high school population is served by one central school (1,719 students) while Lawrence has divided its high school population (3,464 students) into a number of subject specific smaller higher schools.
On nearly every standardized measure of performance, Andover’s results are far above that of Lawrence. The Lawrence district has twice as many students as Andover, most of which are not native English speakers (87%). Many Lawrence high school students are living in low income households (86%). 14% of Lawrence High School Students have limited English Proficiency as compared to less than 1% for Andover. Students in the Lawrence community are allocated about the same per student expenditure on education as Andover, roughly $12,000 per student per year.
Average teacher salaries are less in Lawrence, even though the job of teaching and reaching lower income, non English speaking kids must be more challenging. Lawrence’s adult population is predominantly Hispanic (75% or more). But the teaching staff at the High School is predominantly white (89%). With 14% of Lawrence’s high school students not able to converse in English and only 10% of the teaching staff from a Hispanic culture, should we be surprised with the disparity of results when compared to Andover. The implications of this cultural gap are many.
