They might or might not have good teachers - or enough teachers. Their schools might or might not be able to take them on day trips. The school map of South Carolina shows a landscape in which race, income, geography, unequal distribution of funds, governance and social issues come together to breed enormous differences in the quality of education students receive and the benefits they derive. But growing up in the South, there has always been inequity, and as much as things have changed, many things have remained exactly the same. A map of the school districts by 1998 and 1999 test scores indicates the problems are not narrowly confined.
Most school districts have merely average performance with a few pockets of success.
And, perhaps because of historical rural poverty and neglect, in many other areas the problems are widespread and urgent. If one paints in red the areas with alarming conditions and abysmal scores, a huge swath of South Carolina turns scarlet. Other districts barely differ from Allendale. Both the BSAP and the MAT-7 are being phased out in favor of a more difficult test, the PACT, but these are the latest available statewide scores. By the age of 10, most South Carolina students are failing to perform as well as their peers nationwide.