This American Life about desegregation in schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:than actual poor black kids with indivdiual responsibility in poor black neighborhoods are screwed. They can go to school and get staight As and graduate completely unprepared for college and with terrible scores on national tests (remember the kid they followed in teh NPR story had teacher actually teach him something on the day they follwoed him).

Are you saying teachers don't teach anything? I don't think it's true.

I have friend who went to a very bad black school, graduated in top and got into a good college. His family couldn't afford tutors, I assure you. I also know a teacher who has been teaching at a failing school. He is a very good teacher and is very motivated. I don't believe that teachers just give up on those kids.

Listen to the NPR story about the kids at that school.. The day the honors kid was shadowed, there was one teacher who cared, showed up the entire class, and taught. That school was the worst of the worst, but even one twice as good is not preparing kids for college. The relative I was talking about went to a school without any AP classes offered. The highest math was trig. LOTS of coaches teaching and, worse, subs teaching for the entire year. And this was a rural white school that attracted better teachers to it than a rural black school would.

Exceptionally smart (and generally exceptional) kids might be OK in this situation. But those are few and far between (and show me even an exceptionally bright kid who come come out of Newton ready for college). The kid with average smarts but lots of personal responsibility and work ethic (like my relative) is not going to make it out without some extraordinary luck (which hasn't befallen her). lack of educational opportunity IS one reason that 9 out of 10 kids born in poverty stay in poverty. But it is also the one that we as a society could do something about. Bus the willing poors to good schools. Those good schools can absorb them without sacrificing their children's success. Turn the failing schools for the poors who don't choose to spend their mornings on a bus into votech schools. The problem with all this, of course, is that there might not be enough good schools within 30 miles. And that is a problem that will get worse with growing wealth disparity. The problem is turf wars and school administration. Can you imagine DCPS shipping students to fairfax and shipping out that money/cutting positions?!

[Anonymous]

OK, we found who is responsible for the ed failure of AA population - the teachers. It's the teachers fault. Wow. A complete lack of accountability.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OK, we found who is responsible for the ed failure of AA population - the teachers. It's the teachers fault. Wow. A complete lack of accountability.

Listen to the story or stop talking out your butt.

[Anonymous]

I got to about page 9 of this thread, and had to stop reading, because it was so depressing. But one thing occurred to me that I wanted to say.

It is toxic, this attitude we seem to have acquired that the road to success has to involve "being the best." "Rising to the top." Like success is some zero sum game, where your child must walk over the lazy, entitled corpses of other, lesser children, in order to... what, get an MBA? Go to med school? An ivy league college (but only if they get a "practical" degree)? This is depressing.

I don't care if my kids are "the best." I want them to learn to enjoy learning. And that is all.

[Anonymous]

Good lord. Do you know any Black people? It's like you think "the AA community" is all one thing, where no one cares about education and everyone just wants a hand out.

She's the daughter of an Indian farmer, from a country where racism is codified. Of course she does not know any black people. She lives in Bethesda.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I got to about page 9 of this thread, and had to stop reading, because it was so depressing. But one thing occurred to me that I wanted to say.

It is toxic, this attitude we seem to have acquired that the road to success has to involve "being the best." "Rising to the top." Like success is some zero sum game, where your child must walk over the lazy, entitled corpses of other, lesser children, in order to... what, get an MBA? Go to med school? An ivy league college (but only if they get a "practical" degree)? This is depressing.

I don't care if my kids are "the best." I want them to learn to enjoy learning. And that is all.

Yes, I agree with you for my own children but somehow I forget this when I think about disadvantaged children (they I start thinking about education a tool to a better life, an approach I typically disparage). Love of learning and curiosity and rich understanding of the world is what I value for my own kids and what I should thus also value for other kids. Disadvantaged kids likely aren't getting this at KIPP any more than at Noyes.

Here's a story my mom taught middle school social studies at a poor black rural and had a whole unit she created on the holocaust. She said the students would sit and listen in complete engrossed silence when she read them Number the Stars. She said you could hear a pin drop in the classroom. But the students were failing their state tests, so the teachers were handed a test prep curriculum that had every day and every lesson spelled out (now my mom exaggerates, so I don't know if it was that bad, but reading them Number the stars and her whole Holocaust lesson was out). So she left the classroom to be a school librarian. I understand students were failing before, but it seems like a focus on education as a tool and tests scores as a measure of how well you are grasping the tool isn't helping.

[Anonymous]

Why is there a dearth of middle class African Americans in Title 1 schools?

Because they can't afford to fail.

This is my observation, and I am white, so if you want to call me an ignorant asshole, it's okay--maybe I am... but middle class black kids don't have the same leeway that middle class white kids do. Their parents need their kids to have the best, and they work their asses off to make sure they get it. They (I hate generalizing like this, but it has been my experience in the past year that my child was in a DCPS) are much more like Asian immigrants, Indian immigrants, Russian immigrants, etc than lazy, entitled white Americans---who assume that they have room to mess up, experiment, try different learning techniques, take a week off and go to Disney (or Europe), opt out of testing, etc.

I say this as a lazy, entitled white American.

I don't freak out if my kid gets a C. I don't get a tutor. I encourage her to try harder next time, and shrug. I might try a title 1 school--and we did--but if it doesn't work, I'll flee to something progressive, not something strict. If my children don't do well on their state tests (this is what I've seen from my friends.... all affluent white people in NYC and Long Island)--the next year, I'll opt out, not drill the kids more. I know that my child will get into college, because her parents got into college. I assume this is our right.

And, for money, I know that tomorrow, if I needed to get an office job to pay the bills, my looks and my mid-atlantic English would get me one in the urban center where I live. I hate the term "white privilege," but I have to acknowledge that it does exist. It lets me be lazy. It lets my peers do things like send their kids to waldorf and not read until they are seven. And it is a bubble, just like being poor and disenfranchised is a bubble.

What I do try to do, is step outside of my bubble. Raise my kids outside of my bubble. And hope that other people, in other bubbles will do the same--have the opportunity to do the same.

We all want what's best for our kids, even if we don't always agree on what that is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Why is there a dearth of middle class African Americans in Title 1 schools?

Because they can't afford to fail.

This is my observation, and I am white, so if you want to call me an ignorant asshole, it's okay--maybe I am... but middle class black kids don't have the same leeway that middle class white kids do. Their parents need their kids to have the best, and they work their asses off to make sure they get it. They (I hate generalizing like this, but it has been my experience in the past year that my child was in a DCPS) are much more like Asian immigrants, Indian immigrants, Russian immigrants, etc than lazy, entitled white Americans---who assume that they have room to mess up, experiment, try different learning techniques, take a week off and go to Disney (or Europe), opt out of testing, etc.

I say this as a lazy, entitled white American.

I don't freak out if my kid gets a C. I don't get a tutor. I encourage her to try harder next time, and shrug. I might try a title 1 school--and we did--but if it doesn't work, I'll flee to something progressive, not something strict. If my children don't do well on their state tests (this is what I've seen from my friends.... all affluent white people in NYC and Long Island)--the next year, I'll opt out, not drill the kids more. I know that my child will get into college, because her parents got into college. I assume this is our right.

And, for money, I know that tomorrow, if I needed to get an office job to pay the bills, my looks and my mid-atlantic English would get me one in the urban center where I live. I hate the term "white privilege," but I have to acknowledge that it does exist. It lets me be lazy. It lets my peers do things like send their kids to waldorf and not read until they are seven. And it is a bubble, just like being poor and disenfranchised is a bubble.

What I do try to do, is step outside of my bubble. Raise my kids outside of my bubble. And hope that other people, in other bubbles will do the same--have the opportunity to do the same.

We all want what's best for our kids, even if we don't always agree on what that is.

I completely agree with this assessment. As a middle/upper SES AA, I feel there's less room to slip up. And so to the extent possible, AAs with means don't play around with education. Which is why you'll see less of them in gentrifying neighborhoods and enrolled in Title I schools. It's not a value judgment at all--I want the best for those children at Title I schools. But I think some AA educated families realistically worry more about negative influences and their children lumped together with AA children from more disadvantaged backgrounds, and treated with lower expectations as a result. So it's JKLMs, HRCSs, a handful of other schools if they're somewhat less risk-averse and have younger kids (Eaton, Shepherd, Cleveland), or private. Just my opinion, but this has been my observation in DC being new to the city.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Why is there a dearth of middle class African Americans in Title 1 schools?

Because they can't afford to fail.

This is my observation, and I am white, so if you want to call me an ignorant asshole, it's okay--maybe I am... but middle class black kids don't have the same leeway that middle class white kids do. Their parents need their kids to have the best, and they work their asses off to make sure they get it. They (I hate generalizing like this, but it has been my experience in the past year that my child was in a DCPS) are much more like Asian immigrants, Indian immigrants, Russian immigrants, etc than lazy, entitled white Americans---who assume that they have room to mess up, experiment, try different learning techniques, take a week off and go to Disney (or Europe), opt out of testing, etc.

I say this as a lazy, entitled white American.

I don't freak out if my kid gets a C. I don't get a tutor. I encourage her to try harder next time, and shrug. I might try a title 1 school--and we did--but if it doesn't work, I'll flee to something progressive, not something strict. If my children don't do well on their state tests (this is what I've seen from my friends.... all affluent white people in NYC and Long Island)--the next year, I'll opt out, not drill the kids more. I know that my child will get into college, because her parents got into college. I assume this is our right.

And, for money, I know that tomorrow, if I needed to get an office job to pay the bills, my looks and my mid-atlantic English would get me one in the urban center where I live. I hate the term "white privilege," but I have to acknowledge that it does exist. It lets me be lazy. It lets my peers do things like send their kids to waldorf and not read until they are seven. And it is a bubble, just like being poor and disenfranchised is a bubble.

What I do try to do, is step outside of my bubble. Raise my kids outside of my bubble. And hope that other people, in other bubbles will do the same--have the opportunity to do the same.

We all want what's best for our kids, even if we don't always agree on what that is.

I completely agree with this assessment. As a middle/upper SES AA, I feel there's less room to slip up. And so to the extent possible, AAs with means don't play around with education. Which is why you'll see less of them in gentrifying neighborhoods and enrolled in Title I schools. It's not a value judgment at all--I want the best for those children at Title I schools. But I think some AA educated families realistically worry more about negative influences and their children lumped together with AA children from more disadvantaged backgrounds, and treated with lower expectations as a result. So it's JKLMs, HRCSs, a handful of other schools if they're somewhat less risk-averse and have younger kids (Eaton, Shepherd, Cleveland), or private. Just my opinion, but this has been my observation in DC being new to the city.

+1 i agree with you and the PP's take on it. another middle/upper SES AA

i listened to part one of this w/such a lump in my throat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I got to about page 9 of this thread, and had to stop reading, because it was so depressing. But one thing occurred to me that I wanted to say.

It is toxic, this attitude we seem to have acquired that the road to success has to involve "being the best." "Rising to the top." Like success is some zero sum game, where your child must walk over the lazy, entitled corpses of other, lesser children, in order to... what, get an MBA? Go to med school? An ivy league college (but only if they get a "practical" degree)? This is depressing.

I don't care if my kids are "the best." I want them to learn to enjoy learning. And that is all.

Yes, I agree with you for my own children but somehow I forget this when I think about disadvantaged children (they I start thinking about education a tool to a better life, an approach I typically disparage). Love of learning and curiosity and rich understanding of the world is what I value for my own kids and what I should thus also value for other kids. Disadvantaged kids likely aren't getting this at KIPP any more than at Noyes.

Here's a story my mom taught middle school social studies at a poor black rural and had a whole unit she created on the holocaust. She said the students would sit and listen in complete engrossed silence when she read them Number the Stars. She said you could hear a pin drop in the classroom. But the students were failing their state tests, so the teachers were handed a test prep curriculum that had every day and every lesson spelled out (now my mom exaggerates, so I don't know if it was that bad, but reading them Number the stars and her whole Holocaust lesson was out). So she left the classroom to be a school librarian. I understand students were failing before, but it seems like a focus on education as a tool and tests scores as a measure of how well you are grasping the tool isn't helping.

Number the Stars has a reading level of around 3rd grade in terms of complexity and word variety. I get that the topic is more sophisticated but the it is an excellent example of the rigor challenge a lot of these kids face. They need the complexity your mom was bringing, but they also need the more complex vocabulary building texts. The tests are like telling a fat kid loose weight, go the McDonalds across the street and get a salad. They tell us we have a problem but they don't get us any solution. Richer content, earlier is key, but that lesson needed to be a lot earlier.

[Anonymous]

I dont care what your skin color is white black whatever. You are going to do everything in your power to get out of a failing school zone. Thats not racisim thats common sense.

Here is a thought exercise. For the last couple of posts. If you said I am a white person instead of an AA the whole forum would be up in arms about racist this racist that.
Such bs and double standards.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I got to about page 9 of this thread, and had to stop reading, because it was so depressing. But one thing occurred to me that I wanted to say.

It is toxic, this attitude we seem to have acquired that the road to success has to involve "being the best." "Rising to the top." Like success is some zero sum game, where your child must walk over the lazy, entitled corpses of other, lesser children, in order to... what, get an MBA? Go to med school? An ivy league college (but only if they get a "practical" degree)? This is depressing.

I don't care if my kids are "the best." I want them to learn to enjoy learning. And that is all.

I agree. This is what will make them emotionally successful and happy adults with fulfilling lives. I also believe that every child should have this opportunity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here is a thought exercise. For the last couple of posts. If you said I am a white person instead of an AA the whole forum would be up in arms about racist this racist that.
Such bs and double standards.

No, it's about experience. I don't try to comment on the experience of having a penis, PP, because I don't have one. Same goes for this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is a thought exercise. For the last couple of posts. If you said I am a white person instead of an AA the whole forum would be up in arms about racist this racist that.
Such bs and double standards.

No, it's about experience. I don't try to comment on the experience of having a penis, PP, because I don't have one. Same goes for this.

+1. It's possible to have a conversation about race, even about racism, that doesn't turn mean and accusatory, but you have to make sure to do a couple of things very deliberately and carefully. The bottom line is, speak from your own experience. Don't try to project your experience onto other people's experience, and don't try to claim experience you don't have. I send my white daughter to a Title 1 school in our neighborhood, so I can claim and speak credibly about the experience of being a white parent at a majority minority school, but I cannot claim or speak credibly about the experiences of my child's low income minority classmates or their parents. There are other people on this thread who can speak to those experiences credibly, because they've been those kids. Me, I was a poor white kid in a poor white school district, but I still recognize that my experience of poverty is objectively different than the experiences my daughter's friends have. Urban vs. rural. 2015 vs. 1990. Black vs. white. There are some experiences of poverty and low expectations that are going to be fairly universal, like the stigma of never having clean clothing or getting crappy school lunch when everyone else brought nice stuff from home, but there are some things that are never going to translate. Most of all? No one ever assumed that I was poor because my parents were lazy or didn't care about education. When white people are poor, people generally assume that they fell on hard times, had some kind of expensive emergency, or whatever. When black people are poor, people are very quick to assume that they did or did not do something to create the situation and that they can just as easily do or not do something in order to resolve the situation. Those assumptions are based in white privilege.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
You keep harping on this $600 a month rent in a great school boundary, so let's do some math together.

Our hypothetical family is a single mom and her two children, ages 2 and 6. Mom works 50 hours per week making the federal minimum wage of $7.25/hour (you said you're in the south so I'm going to assume that your state doesn't have a higher minimum wage). She makes $362/week, pre-tax (for the purposes of our exercise we won't worry about taxes). She works 52 weeks a year since she doesn't have any time off, so she makes an untaxed $18,850 per year. Her $600 rent is $7200 per year. Daycare for her youngest is $100/week since you are in a low COL area, or $5200/year. She's spending $12,400/year on rent and daycare. That leaves $6,450 left. That breaks down to $537/month to cover food, all bills, transportation, insurance (her minimum wage job obviously isn't providing insurance), before and aftercare, and everything else that she might need for her family to survive.

So no, that $600 a month rent in the best school boundary no longer seems so affordable. It's all relative.

What a bs numbers.

Low income single mothers get free day care, WICs and other forms of financial support. Possibly free housing because we have free public housing and someone is living there.

I have a niece who's a single mother of two. She doesn't even work, both of her kids get free daycare, she receives food stamps, and other benefits. She also is eligible for free college education, but is she getting it? No. I think we all know why. Because it's a question of motivation.

Also, if she's working 50 hours a week, she's making OT at 1.5x her hourly rate for 10 of those hours, so $398/week. While I am NOT trying to say this is a great way to live, let's at least be honest about the numbers.