Study on DC school lottery and school segregation

[Anonymous]

I just can't today with all these white parents doing back flips to prove "race has nothing to do with it, it's just my friends saying the school is good!"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just can't today with all these white parents doing back flips to prove "race has nothing to do with it, it's just my friends saying the school is good!"

My favorite is when people say they can't enroll their kids because of 'test scores' but then decry over-testing / inappropriateness of PARCC / opt their children out of testing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just can't today with all these white parents doing back flips to prove "race has nothing to do with it, it's just my friends saying the school is good!"

My favorite is when people say they can't enroll their kids because of 'test scores' but then decry over-testing / inappropriateness of PARCC / opt their children out of testing.

You really can't understand what that means? You're not clear on what a rich curriculum is? Or well-informed classmates who can contribute meaningfully? You don't get how an intellectual life can lead someone to perform well on a relatively basic standardized test without having the test drummed into his head so that he can pass?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just can't today with all these white parents doing back flips to prove "race has nothing to do with it, it's just my friends saying the school is good!"

I just can't today with all these non-white parents doing back flips to prove people are racist for wanting to find their children a good education.

Your number one job as a parent is to take care of your own children. So... if other parents are doing their best to take care of their children, it might involve them making some decisions you don't like. Fortunately for you, those aren't your children, so move along.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just can't today with all these white parents doing back flips to prove "race has nothing to do with it, it's just my friends saying the school is good!"

My favorite is when people say they can't enroll their kids because of 'test scores' but then decry over-testing / inappropriateness of PARCC / opt their children out of testing.

You really can't understand what that means? You're not clear on what a rich curriculum is? Or well-informed classmates who can contribute meaningfully? You don't get how an intellectual life can lead someone to perform well on a relatively basic standardized test without having the test drummed into his head so that he can pass?

It's fine to be all about a rich curriculum and wanting to avoid testing..

But if you are ALSo going to reject a MS or HS that offers a strong IB or STEM curriculum, because of their past test scores, I think you are being hypocritical. Test scores are either a valid measure, or they aren't.

[Anonymous]

I want to speak up a little (not a lot) for the people who are castigated by articles and studies like this.

The article makes a big deal out of white people wanting their group to be 26% of the middle school population. Aggregated, along with housing segregation (that is real and harmful but no one can wish away short term) and the actual makeup of DCPS this preference creates even more segregated enclaves of white students.

I get the harmful and separative effects. It is hard not to get that segregation is part of what makes success for DC students without successful parents so difficult.

But can we just give a little credit to some people who ask for not blunt walls of segregation, as their grandparents did, or segregation by suburb, as their parents did, but only to have a certain minority percentage of students in the school like their children? These are not Trump voters or people who "don't see color" or the like.

I agree with sentiments of many others that if white people were more willing to join the system at small percentages below or at their proportions in their neighborhoods, at least, the whole system would be less segregated. Our family is in such a DCPS school (3% white) and likes it while acknowledging that not everyone does or would.

But while we acknowledge the aggregate effects of a mismatch between white student participation (~10%) and desired cohort population (25%) let's at least acknowledge that white DC isn't looking for something that is obviously terrible in terms of racial makeup. It's a minority of almost 3 to 1.

In context, i.e., combined with class and parental education, unwillingness of probably every parent west of the Anacostia to choose schools in hyper-class and race and education and success-segregated Ward 7 and 8 and all that, sure, there are big problems with segregation.

But the expressed desired percentage issue is not crazy Neanderthal cryptoracism. It just has magnified effects in context.

[Anonymous]

At the elementary-school level, white Washington parents prioritized schools where about 60 percent of the student body was white and were slightly more likely to avoid schools with larger percentages of white children. At the middle school level, the researchers found that the “bliss point” for white parents was a student body that was 26 percent white.

this seems terribly flawed. If parents had a realistic shot at JKLM schools via lottery parents of any race would prioritize a school regardless of how high its % of white students. These schools are infrequently prioritized because parents are more likely attempt to lottery into schools with realistic prospects than pie in the sky. Are they assuming I wouldn't take a spot at JKLM if that was a realistic possibility?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just can't today with all these white parents doing back flips to prove "race has nothing to do with it, it's just my friends saying the school is good!"

My favorite is when people say they can't enroll their kids because of 'test scores' but then decry over-testing / inappropriateness of PARCC / opt their children out of testing.

You really can't understand what that means? You're not clear on what a rich curriculum is? Or well-informed classmates who can contribute meaningfully? You don't get how an intellectual life can lead someone to perform well on a relatively basic standardized test without having the test drummed into his head so that he can pass?

It's fine to be all about a rich curriculum and wanting to avoid testing..

But if you are ALSo going to reject a MS or HS that offers a strong IB or STEM curriculum, because of their past test scores, I think you are being hypocritical. Test scores are either a valid measure, or they aren't.

That's absurd. It is quite readonable to think that testing can provide useful information about students without buying that it should be yesrly, that it should drive teacher ratings, that it should dominate classtoom attention.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There has been academic work done on the "tipping point" for white people to feel that a neighborhood is "too Black/brown" and it is startlingly low.

The first wave of white people will leave if a neighborhood is just 5% white [do you mean 5% non-white?], and most white people will choose to leave at a tipping point of about 11%.

I would expect that can be extrapolated to schools as well, which means that white tolerance for Black/brown classmates is significantly lower than the share of Black/brown folks in the country.

Source?

Also, how does this claim translate to DC, where hardly any neighborhoods are 90% white? If what you're claiming is true, then DC should be suffering massive white flight. Instead, what we see is white gentrifiers flocking to move into "black" neighborhoods. The facts around us don't seem to square with your claim.

Enrollment at the local school trails/lags behind gentrification.

Right. You see neighborhoods that are trending whiter get more white inhabitants, but those folks often wait to buy until they have "won" the charter lottery or with a clear plan for what they will do if they are "shut out." Using the local (majority Black) public is a choice that very very few white folks make when moving into majority Black communities.

As for the data, it shows what happens when majority white neighborhoods become Blacker, and the tipping point is about 11% for wholescale white flight. That's different than gentrification, where white people move in under the assumption that they will eventually be the majority.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But reputation aboslutely turns on race. Otherwise you can't explain Banneker and Howard MS. As well as all the parents who deem a neighborhood ES to be "improving" by dint of white enrollment (and no other changes whatsoever.) Really, all you have to do is read DCUM to understand the racial aspects of white DC parent preferences.

I agree that deciding on reputation can often reflect race, but I don't agree reputation is primarily driven by race. People of all races largely live in same-race communities, and most often have a majority of same-race friends. So when someone turns to her community to get a sense of reputation, she's most often getting same-race feedback. If a white parent hears 10 of her white neighbors tell her that they're attending School A and it's getting really good, I suspect she's more likely to believe those 10 neighbors and choose School A rather than choose School B, even if School B might have 5% higher scores. So in that scenario, is our white parent choosing School A because it's more white, or is she choosing it because neighbors she knows and trusts told her it's good?

NP here and I disagree with the bolded. Let's be honest, the first criteria to get HRCS status is a good number of white students. Several on the list have unimpressive test scores or are so new they don't have scores yet. Parents can't be sure any learning is going on, but the presence of white students increases their comfort levels.

And as much as crunchy posters here claim to hate Kipp's "drill and kill" style, you better believe they are doing that type of supplementing to make up for loosey goosey teaching at these non-traditional programs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But reputation aboslutely turns on race. Otherwise you can't explain Banneker and Howard MS. As well as all the parents who deem a neighborhood ES to be "improving" by dint of white enrollment (and no other changes whatsoever.) Really, all you have to do is read DCUM to understand the racial aspects of white DC parent preferences.

I agree that deciding on reputation can often reflect race, but I don't agree reputation is primarily driven by race. People of all races largely live in same-race communities, and most often have a majority of same-race friends. So when someone turns to her community to get a sense of reputation, she's most often getting same-race feedback. If a white parent hears 10 of her white neighbors tell her that they're attending School A and it's getting really good, I suspect she's more likely to believe those 10 neighbors and choose School A rather than choose School B, even if School B might have 5% higher scores. So in that scenario, is our white parent choosing School A because it's more white, or is she choosing it because neighbors she knows and trusts told her it's good?

NP here and I disagree with the bolded. Let's be honest, the first criteria to get HRCS status is a good number of white students. Several on the list have unimpressive test scores or are so new they don't have scores yet. Parents can't be sure any learning is going on, but the presence of white students increases their comfort levels.

And as much as crunchy posters here claim to hate Kipp's "drill and kill" style, you better believe they are doing that type of supplementing to make up for loosey goosey teaching at these non-traditional programs.

I agree, the first criteria to get HRCS status is to get a good number of white students. The reason for this though, is that DC is very unique in that there are almost no poor whites living in the city, and the vast majority of whites are upper-middle class or upper class. DC is also unique in that the middle class is very small, and you either have people being very well off, or people living in poverty. That being said, most families in DC want their kids attending schools that are primarily composed of kids from poverty-stricken families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But reputation aboslutely turns on race. Otherwise you can't explain Banneker and Howard MS. As well as all the parents who deem a neighborhood ES to be "improving" by dint of white enrollment (and no other changes whatsoever.) Really, all you have to do is read DCUM to understand the racial aspects of white DC parent preferences.

I agree that deciding on reputation can often reflect race, but I don't agree reputation is primarily driven by race. People of all races largely live in same-race communities, and most often have a majority of same-race friends. So when someone turns to her community to get a sense of reputation, she's most often getting same-race feedback. If a white parent hears 10 of her white neighbors tell her that they're attending School A and it's getting really good, I suspect she's more likely to believe those 10 neighbors and choose School A rather than choose School B, even if School B might have 5% higher scores. So in that scenario, is our white parent choosing School A because it's more white, or is she choosing it because neighbors she knows and trusts told her it's good?

NP here and I disagree with the bolded. Let's be honest, the first criteria to get HRCS status is a good number of white students. Several on the list have unimpressive test scores or are so new they don't have scores yet. Parents can't be sure any learning is going on, but the presence of white students increases their comfort levels.

And as much as crunchy posters here claim to hate Kipp's "drill and kill" style, you better believe they are doing that type of supplementing to make up for loosey goosey teaching at these non-traditional programs.

they SHOULD be drilling at home, but their white privilege leads them to believe "my kid will be fine wherever she goes to school."*

*as long as it has no more than carefully curated diversity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I want to speak up a little (not a lot) for the people who are castigated by articles and studies like this.

The article makes a big deal out of white people wanting their group to be 26% of the middle school population. Aggregated, along with housing segregation (that is real and harmful but no one can wish away short term) and the actual makeup of DCPS this preference creates even more segregated enclaves of white students.

I get the harmful and separative effects. It is hard not to get that segregation is part of what makes success for DC students without successful parents so difficult.

But can we just give a little credit to some people who ask for not blunt walls of segregation, as their grandparents did, or segregation by suburb, as their parents did, but only to have a certain minority percentage of students in the school like their children? These are not Trump voters or people who "don't see color" or the like.

I agree with sentiments of many others that if white people were more willing to join the system at small percentages below or at their proportions in their neighborhoods, at least, the whole system would be less segregated. Our family is in such a DCPS school (3% white) and likes it while acknowledging that not everyone does or would.

But while we acknowledge the aggregate effects of a mismatch between white student participation (~10%) and desired cohort population (25%) let's at least acknowledge that white DC isn't looking for something that is obviously terrible in terms of racial makeup. It's a minority of almost 3 to 1.

In context, i.e., combined with class and parental education, unwillingness of probably every parent west of the Anacostia to choose schools in hyper-class and race and education and success-segregated Ward 7 and 8 and all that, sure, there are big problems with segregation.

But the expressed desired percentage issue is not crazy Neanderthal cryptoracism. It just has magnified effects in context.

Er, I think that any racial quota requirement is obviously terrible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But reputation aboslutely turns on race. Otherwise you can't explain Banneker and Howard MS. As well as all the parents who deem a neighborhood ES to be "improving" by dint of white enrollment (and no other changes whatsoever.) Really, all you have to do is read DCUM to understand the racial aspects of white DC parent preferences.

I agree that deciding on reputation can often reflect race, but I don't agree reputation is primarily driven by race. People of all races largely live in same-race communities, and most often have a majority of same-race friends. So when someone turns to her community to get a sense of reputation, she's most often getting same-race feedback. If a white parent hears 10 of her white neighbors tell her that they're attending School A and it's getting really good, I suspect she's more likely to believe those 10 neighbors and choose School A rather than choose School B, even if School B might have 5% higher scores. So in that scenario, is our white parent choosing School A because it's more white, or is she choosing it because neighbors she knows and trusts told her it's good?

NP here and I disagree with the bolded. Let's be honest, the first criteria to get HRCS status is a good number of white students. Several on the list have unimpressive test scores or are so new they don't have scores yet. Parents can't be sure any learning is going on, but the presence of white students increases their comfort levels.

And as much as crunchy posters here claim to hate Kipp's "drill and kill" style, you better believe they are doing that type of supplementing to make up for loosey goosey teaching at these non-traditional programs.

they SHOULD be drilling at home, but their white privilege leads them to believe "my kid will be fine wherever she goes to school."*

*as long as it has no more than carefully curated diversity.

Why?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But reputation aboslutely turns on race. Otherwise you can't explain Banneker and Howard MS. As well as all the parents who deem a neighborhood ES to be "improving" by dint of white enrollment (and no other changes whatsoever.) Really, all you have to do is read DCUM to understand the racial aspects of white DC parent preferences.

I agree that deciding on reputation can often reflect race, but I don't agree reputation is primarily driven by race. People of all races largely live in same-race communities, and most often have a majority of same-race friends. So when someone turns to her community to get a sense of reputation, she's most often getting same-race feedback. If a white parent hears 10 of her white neighbors tell her that they're attending School A and it's getting really good, I suspect she's more likely to believe those 10 neighbors and choose School A rather than choose School B, even if School B might have 5% higher scores. So in that scenario, is our white parent choosing School A because it's more white, or is she choosing it because neighbors she knows and trusts told her it's good?

NP here and I disagree with the bolded. Let's be honest, the first criteria to get HRCS status is a good number of white students. Several on the list have unimpressive test scores or are so new they don't have scores yet. Parents can't be sure any learning is going on, but the presence of white students increases their comfort levels.

And as much as crunchy posters here claim to hate Kipp's "drill and kill" style, you better believe they are doing that type of supplementing to make up for loosey goosey teaching at these non-traditional programs.

they SHOULD be drilling at home, but their white privilege leads them to believe "my kid will be fine wherever she goes to school."*

*as long as it has no more than carefully curated diversity.

Why?

because otherwise they will end up with an 8th grader who doesn't know the names of the months of the year (true story I learned on DCUM about a HRCS).