Hope for DCPS?

[Anonymous]

Looks like Brooklyn was able to desegregate its middle school without a mass exodus of white families with an all lottery system. (Gift link to article below.) This gives me hope for DCPS.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/20/nyregion/brooklyn-middle-schools-integration.html?unlocked_article_code=1.1E0.9euG.LTM9vENFewfb&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Looks like Brooklyn was able to desegregate its middle school without a mass exodus of white families with an all lottery system. (Gift link to article below.) This gives me hope for DCPS.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/20/nyregion/brooklyn-middle-schools-integration.html?unlocked_article_code=1.1E0.9euG.LTM9vENFewfb&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

Hope for DCPS to do ... what? How would you apply what was done in a very targeted section of Brooklyn to DCPS?

[Anonymous]

I am confused in that all of the white kids already attending DCPS public middle schools attend desegregated schools. This is a supply issue; you would need to peel people away from charters and privates to make a meaningful dent in desegregating other DCPS public middle schools.

Deal's stats:
22% Black/African-American
6% Asian
19% Hispanic / Latino
46% White non-Hispanic
7% Multiracial

Hardy's stats:
Black: 28%
Hispanic/Latino: 18%
White: 40%
Asian: 7%
Multiple races: 7%

[Anonymous]

This is about the quality of education at the predominantly-Black middle schools, full stop. There are thousands of white families in DC that live EOTP and would love to have a safe, challenging middle school to send their kids to. It just doesn't exist. Hell, even tons of Black and Brown families are opting out of DC's public middle schools.

[Anonymous]

The larger issue is white families peeling off to the suburbs and independent / private schools. The total number of white students currently in the system is not large enough to desegregate substantially all of the schools.

Blaming the white families who have stayed for the issue of white flight, which is ongoing for parents of school age children, is putting the blame in the wrong spot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is about the quality of education at the predominantly-Black middle schools, full stop. There are thousands of white families in DC that live EOTP and would love to have a safe, challenging middle school to send their kids to. It just doesn't exist. Hell, even tons of Black and Brown families are opting out of DC's public middle schools.

The schools in fact exist (EH and SH) but people find infinite reasons to disparage them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The larger issue is white families peeling off to the suburbs and independent / private schools. The total number of white students currently in the system is not large enough to desegregate substantially all of the schools.

Blaming the white families who have stayed for the issue of white flight, which is ongoing for parents of school age children, is putting the blame in the wrong spot.

Yes, I felt like the article didn’t address the “pull” factors to keep people with other options in the system. It’s also not really applicable to DC because this area of Brooklyn is denser and has public transit. The DC equivalent would be a DC-wide assignment system which would not fly for many reasons. In DC what we need is more pull-factors to attend schools on the Hill (and other areas where there are more white kids in elementary but not MS) because you cannot force people not to move or go charter or private. And yes, parents need to open their minds too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is about the quality of education at the predominantly-Black middle schools, full stop. There are thousands of white families in DC that live EOTP and would love to have a safe, challenging middle school to send their kids to. It just doesn't exist. Hell, even tons of Black and Brown families are opting out of DC's public middle schools.

The schools in fact exist (EH and SH) but people find infinite reasons to disparage them.

Two few kids on grade-level.

[Anonymous]

It feels so weird to say that DCPS "needs" white families. Yuck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is about the quality of education at the predominantly-Black middle schools, full stop. There are thousands of white families in DC that live EOTP and would love to have a safe, challenging middle school to send their kids to. It just doesn't exist. Hell, even tons of Black and Brown families are opting out of DC's public middle schools.

The schools in fact exist (EH and SH) but people find infinite reasons to disparage them.

If those are your exapmples of quality, challenging, middle schools, then you've already failed

[Anonymous]

There are white kids at Ida B. Wells and MacFarland. Doing quite well at both. Finding challenges. They are not Deal and they are not BASIS in size or scope of opportunities at the top to challenge kids, and we know you don't like having the disruptive demographics in your kids school, so I think few DCUM minds are going to change.

But I think that after word of mouth gets out that there will be a gradual shift in thinking. Glacial, given how static view on this damn site are, but change will come.

[Anonymous]

My white and Hispanic middle class child was just promoted from a DCPS EOTP middle school having enjoyed the experience and had a lot of academic success. I'm not sure it's worth identifying myself and the child on this site.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It feels so weird to say that DCPS "needs" white families. Yuck.

It does feel weird but if the goal is diverse schools then yes they "need" white families.

Here is a good place to note that diversity is not actually the goal of many of the non-white families in DCPS -- while white families in DCPS like the idea of sending their kids to diverse schools with plenty of non-white people not all black families dream of sending their kids to schools with a substantial percentage of white kids. Some black families are indifferent. Some are wary but generally see a benefit in more higher income students in a school in terms of the quality of education. But some are actually hostily towards it and worry that having more than 10-20% white families will change the culture of the school in a way that will diminish it as a place that black kids feel welcome and celebrated.

Understanding these attitudes is pretty central to any conversation about how we "improve" DCPS schools -- many white people enter DCPS with PK students and assume that everyone in the system wants the exact same things they do and that's just not the case. I would highly encourage anyone contemplating these issues to actually TALK to black DCPS families especially those who have sent generations of students to DCPS schools and have a different perspective on the city's public schools and their direction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It feels so weird to say that DCPS "needs" white families. Yuck.

Of course DCPS doesn't need white families.

[Anonymous]

When the demographics of the city are 40% black and 40% white, then the public schools should reflect that. And they often don't.