One thing is clear from studying how the U.S. population is changing: the states are becoming more unlike one another. "Nothing is distributed equally across the United States," said demographer Harold Hodgkinson, who currently conducts research for the Center for Demographic Policy. "If you look at the Hispanic population, for example, 10 states have 90 percent of the American Hispanics."
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"Therefore, to have a single national standard, measured by a single national test, with a single national cutting score—which is very likely to happen, I believe—would not be a good thing for America," Hodgkinson asserted.
"As the population changes, we need to think about how we can best [capture] the attention of young people from a variety of backgrounds," he said. The best strategies for doing so will vary enormously from Maine, where only 12 percent of the people will be identified as minorities in 20 years, to the six states in which no group will be a majority.
In addition, teachers in some states have to cope with far more transience than others do, Hodgkinson pointed out. In Pennsylvania, 90 percent of adults surveyed say they were born in the state; in Nevada, that figure drops to a mere 22 percent. "Stability is terribly important to teachers," he said. "If you're teaching kids whom you know, you're in a much better position than if you're dealing with a bunch of strangers all the time."
The states also differ markedly in the percentage of 19-year-olds who have been graduated from high school and admitted to college. "The range is from 55 to 60 percent at the top of the list, to 25 to 30 percent at the bottom," Hodgkinson said.
"All of the demographics suggest that we need to give states more leeway in how they accomplish their [educational] objectives," he said. Different states will need to use different strategies, and they won't necessarily get the same results. "The richness of American education is its diversity," he said, "and I cannot imagine how we could fail to acknowledge that diversity."