The educational achievement gap is a reality for some disadvantaged students -- only seven out of 120 seventh-grade students in a North Carolina school knew the name of the President of the United States, Christina Bortey said.

Bortey, a corps member for Teach for America and a 2006 Penn State graduate, said some of the students are even grade levels behind in reading.

"A lot of the kids in the school in my county do not know where Iraq is located," Bortey said.

Last night, as part of the 2007 Penn State Martin Luther King, Jr. Commemoration, a panel of education experts spoke on the topic of race and educational inequality at the HUB Auditorium.

Bortey said if more people knew about the gap then there would be a larger effort to change.

"Too many of us are ignorant of the problems in education," Bortey said. "We assume everyone is on an equal playing field."

The discussion on race and educational inequality centered on possible solutions to closing the achievement gap between people of different races and incomes.

Abby Smith, Teach for America recruitment director at Penn State, said that when dealing with educational inequality, people should focus not on the gravity of the problem but on how to solve the problem.

Smith said some of the inequality comes from lack of funding, poor leadership within schools and low expectations for both students and teachers.

"I think some solutions rely on the schools," Smith said. "There are multiple solutions and this is a solvable problem."

Smith said the biggest disservice to students is done when teachers cater to the problems students may face at home by making the workload easier.

She said that instead, they should be presented with the possibility of excelling in the classroom.

"Give them something to be excited about academically," Smith said.

Lori Donoho, director of programs for the "I Have a Dream" Foundation, said she believes her job is to advocate for children who do not have people to advocate for them.

"There isn't a legacy of education or academic achievement," Donoho said. "They don't see anyone in their family studying so they don't know what that looks like."

Donoho said the lack of minorities at Penn State is not the fault of the minorities themselves because an underlying cause lies within the educational system.

"When do you stop making excuses for people not learning?" Donoho said. "You have to take responsibility as a teacher so anyone can go to college."

Donoho said a solution is to create an environment for success instead of treating children as low-income students because "they know they're getting something that is watered down."

"It doesn't make sense to let your zip code determine what you can learn," Donoho said. "I set high standards and I do not back up one bit."

Andrea Gacki, a trial attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice, said she was not well trained in class management when she began teaching in 1991 as a Teach for America corps member.

"I was not prepared for the condition of the school I was sent to," Gacki said.

Gacki said students who go to schools that have low funding simply will not have the same advantages .

Mark McClinchie, principal of Propel-McKeesport, an elementary charter school in Pennsylvania, said changes in the way students in colleges of education are taught could also be a solution to educational inequality.

"I see a lot of schools of education doing the same thing they did twenty years ago," McClinchie said.

He said that people who have gone through Teach for America have been prepared and usually enter the classroom for all the right reasons.

"This is a profession where we need to raise the standard of instruction," McClinchie said.

Lindsay Baer (junior-elementary education) said she is thinking about applying for Teach for America so she can teach in an atmosphere different than where she grew up.

"I want to get more involved in the racial issues with inequality," Baer said. "I want to help the cause."