Harvard report points to resegregation of schools (plus mhking on NPR!)

Harvard Civil Rights Project ^ | 8.13.02

[mhking]

Cambridge, MA     It has been almost 50 years since the initial Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court ruling banning segregation and more than a decade into a period in which the U.S. Supreme Court has authorized termination of desegregation orders. These plans are being dissolved by court orders even in some communities that want to maintain them; in addition, some federal courts are forbidding even voluntary desegregation plans.

While the 2000 Census results illustrate that the United States has more racial and ethnic diversity than ever before, school data from the year 2000-2001 collected by the U.S. Department of Education indicates that school children are largely isolated from this growing diversity. The Civil Rights Project at Harvard University's new report, Race in American Public Schools: Rapidly Resegregating School Districts, disaggregates national data to the district level in order to examine the patterns of segregation as they affect our nation's youth.

The report focuses on segregation levels in moderate to large sized public school districts. Based on 2000 data, the analysis concentrated on the 239 school districts with total enrollment greater than 25,000. This trend is significant and clear: virtually all school districts analyzed are becoming more segregated for black and Latino students.

Some of the key findings of this study which examines segregation trends in large school districts across the country are:

• Many of the districts experiencing the highest black-white resegregation are also resegregating in Latino exposure to whites.
  
  
• Districts that show the least resegregation in black-white exposure are mostly in the South, likely due to lingering effects of desegregation plans in these districts where the plans have been dissolved and the continuing impacts of plans still in place.
  
  

• Despite an increasingly racially diverse public school enrollment, white students in over one-third of the districts analyzed became more isolated from black and/or Latino students, from 1986-2000.
  
  
• Blacks are the most isolated from whites in districts with either no desegregation plans or where the courts rejected a city-suburban desegregation. The most integrated districts for black students are in districts with city-suburban plans, even though all of these districts have since been declared unitary and show a trend toward resegregating.

[mhking]

I'm scheduled to be on Tavis Smiley's NPR show tomorrow (Wednesday) morning to discuss this thing. It's a non sequitur to me; the report is true in that schools are falling according to where people live.

Contrary to what the pointy-head folks want to believe, communities across America are becoming increasingly Balkanized, and as such, you will find plenty of homogeneous bedroom communities nationwide.

The schools reflect that trend, as most children attend schools within their neighborhoods. This is something that will be much more apparent in larger cities, but you can see it everywhere.

The report implies that other action may be necessary, but I disagree. The families should send their children where they want to. If that means sending them to the local school (which is what most parents would prefer to do), so be it. If it means sending their children to private school, so be it. But programs such as those in Fulton County that send school students fifty and sixty miles across the county in order to satisfy some misbegotten notion of racial harmony makes no sense, and does nothing to help the issue.

I kind of flummoxed the producer with this one earlier today, and actually, I thought they may have bailed on the program, but go figure.

The piece will air in the first segment of the program (7:06-7:18A if your station carries the show live), and from what I understand, the program will be archived on the web after 12 Noon ET on the show's section of NPR's site (http://www.npr.org/).

[mhking]

Black conservative ping

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Extra warning: this is a high-volume ping list.

[B Knotts]

Most "segregation" in the future will be the result of responsible parents of all races/ethnicities "segregating" their children from failing public schools.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Here is an interesting case study for you to consider, the 30-year old Kansas City federal court desegregation case.  After spending over $2 billion dollars the district today is a complete disaster.

[Shermy]

Despite an increasingly racially diverse public school enrollment, white students in over one-third of the districts analyzed became more isolated from black and/or Latino students, from 1986-2000.

Perhaps this coincides with the rise in "multicultural" education. Multiculturalism is contrary to integration. It is a social zookeeping philosophy create white liberals to "celebrate" differences, in other words, emphasize, propagate, and create differences. It is a segregationist policy that makes white liberals feel good since they feel guilty about their own culture, which they define as "white" rather than American. Rather than letting the people and culture integrate from below, we now have busybodies from above propagating and policing alleged and real differences, and starting on the youth.

[Shermy]

" - created by - "

[What Is Ain't]

Won't see it live but look forward to "meeting" you in the archive room. Good luck!

[A Navy Vet]

Kudos to you, sir.

[Drango]

I'm scheduled to be on Tavis Smiley's NPR show tomorrow (Wednesday) morning

Sleeping with the devil I see(grin). Good luck & break a leg.

[eddie willers]

What station in Atlanta cares the show?

[antivenom]

AHHHHH mention how NICELY "school vouchers" will work...it is UP to the parent to select their child's school...and a VOUCHER will meet that need nicely!

I see NEAA all over this...they decided they can't fight the voucher program (because it makes WAYYYY TOO much sense) so they are gonna dredge up the OLD segegation and racist bullcrap to make their point that the GHETTO schools are stinky not because they have elected lousy leftist pin-head educrats to run (ruin) them, but because middle class and higher has moved far away and the tax base followed the economics that surround the successful class in that society.

It will be the same old angle played out AGAIN to satisify the poverty pimp's victim status for their group.

PLACE the blame where it lies...at the feet of the elected poverty pimps who pimp their constituents for their personal gain...point out that the schools that are continuing to suffer are the ghetto schools that have a captive audience...and NO competition...

ONLY answer for failing and segragated schools are V-O-U-C-H-E-R-S!

[Drango]

Did you check out this article on Smiley?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/725023/posts

[AdA$tra]

Greetings from the home of the Brown vs. Board case, Topeka, Kansas. The original case was 100% correct. A girl named Brown who lived across the street from Sumner school was forced to attend a "seperate but equal" school across town in a predominately black neighborhood. Regardless of whether the school was "equal" or not it was simply WRONG. Recently the the original case was re-opened. Why, I cannot imagine, as any student was allowed to attend any Topeka public school they wanted to. The result was that many of the best neighborhood public schools were closed in order to make way for "magnet" schools located in high crime areas of town. The magnet school concept failed miserably in KCMO over the last few decades, so obviously it was the solution of choice here. In my opinion my neighbors across the street, the Browns, should have sued, saying their littel girl was being forced to attend school across town when Gage school (just around the corner) was closed for no good reason. My boys attend our small, underfunded, neighborhood parish school so the only adverse effect on me is paying our confiscatory property taxes to fund failing public schools for other children plus a tithing commitment to educate my own children. I was exposed to the racism of many members of my parent's generation. My kids had never even heard of the concept of racism. I had to explain it to my ten-year-old a few months ago and he was shocked that anyone would even care about race as he had never really thought about it. We live in a racially mixed, middle or "working" class neighborhood which reflects the growing trend of the black middle-class's silent revolution. I think these issues would mostly go away if it weren't for a small vocal minority of liberals who thrive on racism for their positions of power.

[valkyrieanne]

I think these issues would mostly go away if it weren't for a small vocal minority of liberals who thrive on racism for their positions of power.

I agree entirely. It's the liberals who are obsessed with categorizing everyone by race; setting quotas; distributing kids in schools by race, etc. Most people would like to just move on and judge people by their merits, their character, their neighborliness.

[AdA$tra]

I think these issues would mostly go away if it weren't for a small vocal minority of liberals who thrive on racism for their positions of power.

The irony is while I write that, that the National Socialist Party, Neo-nazis from St. Paul, MN,) are having a rally at our state capitol building next weekend. So, in all fairness there is a small minority of white nazis that are a problem as well. Although I have never understood to so-called connection between fascists and a "right wing". They are essentially socialists with a hate agenda.

[BraveMan]

Good luck with the show; it should be interesting . . .

[hellinahandcart]

Good luck tomorrow!

[ninenot]

Frankly, I can think of very few things which would make grade school MORE difficult than arising at 6:00AM to catch a bus and not returning home until 5:00 PM from the bus.

But they made children do it in Milwaukee, and now complain about "failing" schools. A whole generation of kids had to learn their 3R's while virtually exhausted.

[AdA$tra]

Good point! When they closed the neighborhood schools here in Topeka, the first unintended consequence was transportation issues caused by bussing them all the way across town. The kids were late for school for about a month until made them catch the bus at an earlier time. Of course they wouldn't need a bus if they attended school less than a block from home.

The amount of cash per child allocated in our district has skyrocketed. So have our property taxes. They built more classrooms to handle more kids but have no money to hire teachers. What a disgrace!