This American Life about desegregation in schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The TAL story had more than a 1,000 kids whose parents enforced education to the extent of putting them a bus to ride 30 miles twice a day. How is that not "working for it"?

Putting your kid on the bus is not "working for it".

The reporter didn't tells us what happened after. She didn't say how well the kids did in the new school (besides the honor student, who is an outlier). Were they failing there? Did they improve? Was there violence? Anyone dropped out? Did it affect the grades of the white students? Did it drop the school's rating? Did the enrollment fall?
We don't know. It's a very narrow sighted story.

My DH went through integration in the 70s. When they busing black kids into his white school there was a lot of violence.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
And if you look beyond your own navel, you may realize that some people aren't you and have different (read: harder) experiences than you. That's not an excuse for them not to take personal responsibility, but it is a reason to work on the things that make life so privileged for some while taking from others.

See, I don't feel that I lead a privileged life. I feel like I've worked hard for everything I have. Including academic success of my children.

I didn't get any special treatment in school because I'm white, I didn't get extra good teachers because I'm white, I didn't get any extra supplies because I'm white. I didn't get the jobs because I'm white. I had to work hard for everything and overcome my own obstacles, injustices and limitations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
And if you look beyond your own navel, you may realize that some people aren't you and have different (read: harder) experiences than you. That's not an excuse for them not to take personal responsibility, but it is a reason to work on the things that make life so privileged for some while taking from others.

See, I don't feel that I lead a privileged life. I feel like I've worked hard for everything I have. Including academic success of my children.

I didn't get any special treatment in school because I'm white, I didn't get extra good teachers because I'm white, I didn't get any extra supplies because I'm white. I didn't get the jobs because I'm white. I had to work hard for everything and overcome my own obstacles, injustices and limitations.

Your parents weren't red-lined into a worse housing situation / school district because...
Your name wasn't tossed from the stack of job applicants because...
You weren't "stopped and frisked" (read: roughed up) or detained on the way to your job interview because you "look like someone who committed a crime" (that happens to people dressed professionally too) because...

No one is saying you didn't work hard. But those are just a few examples of privileges you may have experienced that other similar people of other skin colors don't get.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

The TAL story had more than a 1,000 kids whose parents enforced education to the extent of putting them a bus to ride 30 miles twice a day. How is that not "working for it"?

Putting your kid on the bus is not "working for it".

The reporter didn't tells us what happened after. She didn't say how well the kids did in the new school (besides the honor student, who is an outlier). Were they failing there? Did they improve? Was there violence? Anyone dropped out? Did it affect the grades of the white students? Did it drop the school's rating? Did the enrollment fall?
We don't know. It's a very narrow sighted story.

My DH went through integration in the 70s. When they busing black kids into his white school there was a lot of violence.

The child waking up at 4:00/4:30 am to catch the 5:45am bus is damn sure working for it! And so is the parent making sure that child is up, fed and ready on time to catch the bus!

In the podcast we are told test scores did not decline at the transfer school. The only violence mentioned was about the nasty names one of the white students called one of the AA students. And the reason we don't get further info is b/c the state ended the transfers and had the AA students shipped back to Normandy!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Your parents weren't red-lined into a worse housing situation / school district because...
Your name wasn't tossed from the stack of job applicants because...
You weren't "stopped and frisked" (read: roughed up) or detained on the way to your job interview because you "look like someone who committed a crime" (that happens to people dressed professionally too) because...

.

It's a free country. You live where you choose.
Resumes don't show the color of my skin.
And police violence affects white people just well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

The child waking up at 4:00/4:30 am to catch the 5:45am bus is damn sure working for it! And so is the parent making sure that child is up, fed and ready on time to catch the bus!

Maybe that's the problem. That you think your job in a kid's education is limited by making sure he catches the bus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Your parents weren't red-lined into a worse housing situation / school district because...
Your name wasn't tossed from the stack of job applicants because...
You weren't "stopped and frisked" (read: roughed up) or detained on the way to your job interview because you "look like someone who committed a crime" (that happens to people dressed professionally too) because...

.

It's a free country. You live where you choose.
Resumes don't show the color of my skin.
And police violence affects white people just well.

That wasn't always the case, even a generation ago (you / your parents depending on your age). Learn some history.
Resumes with names like Jamal and Shaniqua (with all else equal) get tossed out at higher rates. See statistics.
Police violence affects non-white people at much higher rates than white people. Did you see the video of the guy giving shit to a police officer and moving away from him (hdan't committed a crime)? Did you see the video of the guy driving away from a police officer during a traffic stop (also hadn't committed a crime)? Guess which one got shot? I know, anecdotes... so check out statistics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Your parents weren't red-lined into a worse housing situation / school district because...
Your name wasn't tossed from the stack of job applicants because...
You weren't "stopped and frisked" (read: roughed up) or detained on the way to your job interview because you "look like someone who committed a crime" (that happens to people dressed professionally too) because...

.

It's a free country. You live where you choose.
Resumes don't show the color of my skin.
And police violence affects white people just well.

Your goggles are filthy. Please clean them. Why can't you see that you have privileges just because you're white. I wish you could live in a black person's skin for just one day. You would quickly retract your pathetically ignorant comments. I feel sorry for you...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Your parents weren't red-lined into a worse housing situation / school district because...
Your name wasn't tossed from the stack of job applicants because...
You weren't "stopped and frisked" (read: roughed up) or detained on the way to your job interview because you "look like someone who committed a crime" (that happens to people dressed professionally too) because...

.

It's a free country. You live where you choose.
Resumes don't show the color of my skin.
And police violence affects white people just well.

Greatest privilege of all: no one with white skin will ever be tainted or judged by your proud ignorance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I see is a bunch of parents (not the honor student from TAL episode, that's an outlier) who failed their kids by not enforcing education at home who made their own school a failing one by failing tests and failing attendance.

Now these parents relinquish responsibility for the failure and demand that it's school's fault they didn't make their kids succeed.

And you want to fix this at the expense of my kid? My kid is supposed to be a crutch for your failing kid? I don't think so. Your success is your job and you have to work for it. No one owes you anything.

The TAL story had more than a 1,000 kids whose parents enforced education to the extent of putting them a bus to ride 30 miles twice a day. How is that not "working for it"? Obviously, the two examples provided were not outliers when it came to valuing an education. The second student in the story who was bused to the suburban schoold ended up tutoring the "crutch" student whose sentiments mirrored what you're expressing here.

What the story posits is that integration is uncomfortable for everyone involved, but no one suffers. No student is exposed to violence or finds their own grades dropping because they're sitting next to a kid who escaped from a failing school. But the grades and the prospects of the transferred students do go up. Because the air is different, the vibe is different, there's running water, heat, air conditioning, roofs that don't collapse, cafeterias that don't flood, a staff that isn't bitter about their shitty working conditions and students who actually want to be there every day.

The Normandy school district made a deliberate attempt to make leaving their school difficult, yet paid more than $10 million in one year to transfer students clamoring to leave. The state, which allowed the school to operate in dysfunction for nearly two decades, changed the status of the school from unaccredited to non-accredited to force their return. Not so that the state could fix the schools or re-establish them as places where learning happens, but rather so that they could appease the racist asshole parents who claim that they couldn't stand any students with violent, brain-dead fail cooties coming into Lake Wobegon school districts, no matter what color their skin. Their fears had about as much reality to them as an 80s horror movie, while Normandy parents who believed their kids futures to be FUBAR were absolutely on the money.

People in this forum spend countless hours trying to suss out these types of interlopers (not saying anything about skin color) who cheat on residency to get their kids into better shcools, simultaneously don't care about education, AND bring down the quality of education for "good" people who care enough about their kids to spend a million dollars on a 1500 sf colonial.

We can't for the life of us or the success of our city figure out the achievement gap, but we are so on top of the poors here. Thank god.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Your kid will be fine, whether a poor kid sits next to them or whether they go to a crappy school.

Right. My kid went to a school that we as a community made great and you now are going to change it to crappy because you were bused here.

That is so narrow and ignorant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

The child waking up at 4:00/4:30 am to catch the 5:45am bus is damn sure working for it! And so is the parent making sure that child is up, fed and ready on time to catch the bus!

Maybe that's the problem. That you think your job in a kid's education is limited by making sure he catches the bus.

You sure seem to think you know a whole lot about every aspect of someone's life that you do not live. How did you gain such detailed insight?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a lot of discussion about black people today. This is just another anecdote.

Here is her picture

Jeff??!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oops, wrong thread.

This is the White House staffer that shot at her Capitol Hill police lover and was arrested.

Is this irony or just a really shitty coincidence?

No it is blatant racism

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:New poster here

Here is the elephant in the room

Why do many Asian and African immigrants generally break the poverty cycle in one generation while other populations don't

It's not SES because most immigrants arrive at the bottom of the SES stack so they have to attend a "crappy" school with parents working crappy long jobs but somehow the students make it

In all honesty, I hear this question over and over again. I know many Africans from different countries. I was an active member of African Society Union in college. I have never met one African immigrant who was impoverished. They may not have come to this country rich, but they were not impoverished in their home countries. The Africans who make it to the U.S. and Canada are not the poor Africans you think you know. They are not the Africans you see when you go outside your gated resort and walk and drive around the countryside.

Now I will readily admit that I don't know very many Asians, but surely the Asians who are paying thousands of dollars to get here to send their kids to TJ while another parent stays in the home country to work cannot be considered a poor immigrant. Where are these poor immigrants, outside of the Central Americans, that you speak?

NP here. When I read PP's comment I automatically thought of the Vietnamese boat people, who came to the U.S. in the hundreds of thousands as refugees at the end of the Vietnam War. Many of them were not the highly educated, highly motivated immigrants you mention, many were working-class or poor in Vietnam (and after years of war and months as refugees before arriving, some were malnourished, sick, and had PTSD). They as a group have done pretty well despite losing everything and arriving in this country only a generation ago, many without speaking any English. If they could make it without becoming criminals and drop-outs, I think AAs can, too.

And now someone will bring up the diaphanous specter of "institutionalized racism" that somehow doesn't affect refugee or other minorities, and only affects AAs.

Do you have any statistics? Growing up in a refugee resettlement area it was always my impression that Hmoung struggled quite a bit.