School Segregation and the Boundary Issues

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

White wotp poster here who is appalled at the "150 years after emancipation proclamation" posters comments. Slavery decimated the social structure, family groups, self-esteem, and mental and physical well-being of a huge proportion of the African American population. It takes more than a handful of generations to overcome such complete evisceration.

+1000 with a high five!

Definitely! Please also keep in mind the huge differences in accumulated wealth between AA and white families and recognize that, for some, that wealth comes from the spoils of slavery. Having wealth (e.g. owned home, parents owned home, money from parents) helps to protect people from the full brunt of mistakes that people of all races make.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think services follow white children in DC. They dont need them and the extras are (in my opinion correctly) directed elsewhere. Look at all the shiny new under-enrolled schools and per pupil spending outide of ward 3.

Extras at w3 schools come from parents not the city.

city.

These are red herrings. If you have lived in any other major city you would know that corruption runs deep in politics. The only difference is that DC has the WAPO and DC is heavily monitored.

No way. I've lived in Boston, NYC and Chicago and DC wins the corruption contest, hands down.

I think it depends on when you lived in NYC. I lived in NYC during the mid 80's and political corruption ran high. On top of the political corruption, neighborhood segregation was far worse there than in DC. People didn't just segregate based on race, but ethnicities as well. II honestly can't speak about NYC current politicians or the segregation, but during the period I lived there, it was hell and the politicians were rotten to the core.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some of these comments are unbelievable. This isn't just about being poor. Do you have any idea how many children in this city are struggling to have their basic needs met? How do you expect them to focus on education when they're concerned about having a roof over their head and food in their bellies? Or wondering whether or not mom or dad will sell them for drug money?

Tell me how many of your Vietnamese fisherman overcame those struggles and we'll talk.

Millions of vietnamese people have already overcome the horrible napalm bombings inflicted on them by whites and black American soldiers just a feo decades ago. Perhaps AAs can learn a thing or two, such as the importance of strong value, hard work and no whinning?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some of these comments are unbelievable. This isn't just about being poor. Do you have any idea how many children in this city are struggling to have their basic needs met? How do you expect them to focus on education when they're concerned about having a roof over their head and food in their bellies? Or wondering whether or not mom or dad will sell them for drug money?

Tell me how many of your Vietnamese fisherman overcame those struggles and we'll talk.

The $350K taxpayer-funded party and concert that Vincent Orange threw in DC this week would have paid for a few meals and motel fooms for poor families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

White wotp poster here who is appalled at the "150 years after emancipation proclamation" posters comments. Slavery decimated the social structure, family groups, self-esteem, and mental and physical well-being of a huge proportion of the African American population. It takes more than a handful of generations to overcome such complete evisceration.

+1000 with a high five!

Definitely! Please also keep in mind the huge differences in accumulated wealth between AA and white families and recognize that, for some, that wealth comes from the spoils of slavery. Having wealth (e.g. owned home, parents owned home, money from parents) helps to protect people from the full brunt of mistakes that people of all races make.

The same point (about historical lack of accumulated wealth) would hold for immigrants who arrive without means, no?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of these comments are unbelievable. This isn't just about being poor. Do you have any idea how many children in this city are struggling to have their basic needs met? How do you expect them to focus on education when they're concerned about having a roof over their head and food in their bellies? Or wondering whether or not mom or dad will sell them for drug money?

Tell me how many of your Vietnamese fisherman overcame those struggles and we'll talk.

Millions of vietnamese people have already overcome the horrible napalm bombings inflicted on them by whites and black American soldiers just a feo decades ago. Perhaps AAs can learn a thing or two, such as the importance of strong value, hard work and no whinning?

I don't think that this comparison of who is worse off (Vietnamese or AA) is very productive. There are many Vietnamese people (and other S.E. Asians to include Cambodian, Laos) who are not faring well and living below the poverty line. And you can't lump the success of all Asians and say that Vietnamese are doing well academically and professionally. In fact, when you see a breakdown of the various ethnic groups within the Asian population, S.E. Asians are not doing well. But more to the point, AA and Asians have different struggles and issues to deal with, and it's comparing apples to oranges. Rather than pit one group against another, let's just agree that there are CHILDREN who are in need of assistance and this squabbling really isn't doing anything to help them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some of these comments are unbelievable. This isn't just about being poor. Do you have any idea how many children in this city are struggling to have their basic needs met? How do you expect them to focus on education when they're concerned about having a roof over their head and food in their bellies? Or wondering whether or not mom or dad will sell them for drug money?

Tell me how many of your Vietnamese fisherman overcame those struggles and we'll talk.

I don't think that anyone disputes the point that there are children in this city who have it very tough, although one can argue over the reasons why that is so. They certainly deserve quality schools. However, the point is that other children shouldn't be forced out of quality schools to achieve that objective.

[Anonymous]

My grandpa got off the boat in 1910 after his parents died with nothing and struggled to make ends meet his whole life. He never spoke english well. But he pushed his kids to get educated so the poverty cycle didn't perpetuate.

At some point you gotta take responsibility and move forward.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The real problem is income segregation. In DC it is all rich white people, all poor brown/black people. It's not like that everywhere. I think here we correlate success to race, but instead it's really success to SES.

DC also has plenty of well-educated, high SES black folks. For some reason, they tend to get left out of the conversation frequently.

Shhh, they still think it is 1952 and it really is hard to educate miseducated people on DCUM. So, let them continue to believe that all the Black folks in DC are poor. It helps them to feel better about themselves.

As previously noted, they send their kids to private mostly, so the conversation is mostly about poor black/brown people when talking about DCPS.

That is why the high SES black and brown folks don't tend to be part of the conversation. But note no one has called us out for betraying our neighborhood schools. Wilson used to be called "Yale or Jail" and I would rather have my kid safe in private "contributing to diversity" than going for a walkabout at Wilson, thank you kindly. My kid can discover his ethnic roots in college right now all I care about is his safety.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The real problem is income segregation. In DC it is all rich white people, all poor brown/black people. It's not like that everywhere. I think here we correlate success to race, but instead it's really success to SES.

DC also has plenty of well-educated, high SES black folks. For some reason, they tend to get left out of the conversation frequently.

Shhh, they still think it is 1952 and it really is hard to educate miseducated people on DCUM. So, let them continue to believe that all the Black folks in DC are poor. It helps them to feel better about themselves.

As previously noted, they send their kids to private mostly, so the conversation is mostly about poor black/brown people when talking about DCPS.

That is why the high SES black and brown folks don't tend to be part of the conversation. But note no one has called us out for betraying our neighborhood schools. Wilson used to be called "Yale or Jail" and I would rather have my kid safe in private "contributing to diversity" than going for a walkabout at Wilson, thank you kindly. My kid can discover his ethnic roots in college right now all I care about is his safety.

+1

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The real problem is income segregation. In DC it is all rich white people, all poor brown/black people. It's not like that everywhere. I think here we correlate success to race, but instead it's really success to SES.

DC also has plenty of well-educated, high SES black folks. For some reason, they tend to get left out of the conversation frequently.

Shhh, they still think it is 1952 and it really is hard to educate miseducated people on DCUM. So, let them continue to believe that all the Black folks in DC are poor. It helps them to feel better about themselves.

As previously noted, they send their kids to private mostly, so the conversation is mostly about poor black/brown people when talking about DCPS.

That is why the high SES black and brown folks don't tend to be part of the conversation. But note no one has called us out for betraying our neighborhood schools. Wilson used to be called "Yale or Jail" and I would rather have my kid safe in private "contributing to diversity" than going for a walkabout at Wilson, thank you kindly. My kid can discover his ethnic roots in college right now all I care about is his safety.

+1

Everyone makes decisions that they feel are best for their families and both of you certainly have the right to do so as well. But, that doesn't change the fact that there are still plenty of well-education, high SES, black families who send their kids to DCPS and charters. It doesn't really make a difference how many similar families make different choices, these families still don't deserve to be ignored. Any conversation based on the suggestion that White = rich and black = poor is fundamentally wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The real problem is income segregation. In DC it is all rich white people, all poor brown/black people. It's not like that everywhere. I think here we correlate success to race, but instead it's really success to SES.

DC also has plenty of well-educated, high SES black folks. For some reason, they tend to get left out of the conversation frequently.

Jesus, "all poor brown/black"??? The President of the United States is Black, if you didn't notice.

As long as you're being apocryphal, you could say "there are few poor white people in DC", and be closer to the mark.

This is really the point. There are brown/black people all over the SES map, however there haven't been any poor white people since white flight. All the white people here are middle class and higher. Ergo, "white" becomes shorthand for "middle class and higher." The next step is that race becomes conflated with SES.

For the record, I think that's mostly a WotP thing. Everybody east of the park knows higher SES brown/black people no matter what race they personally happen to be.

well some of the white flight was parents continuing to stay in DC just putting their kids (like me) in private schools. Of course at that point the tuition was easy to pay for two or three kids on one income, even at NCS etc. Now we are talking about white flight out of the city, not just out of the schools, because i cannot afford privates for my 3 kids so it is go charter or go MoCo if this nonsense happens

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

A good perspective. I'm always amazed at the stories of immigrants, such as the Vietnamese boat people who arrived in this country with absolutely NOTHING, not even speaking the language. Many took menial jobs or became fishermen in places like Louisiana not known for their openness. Within a few years their some of their kids were going to great universities. Meanwhile, others yammer on about wanting "reparations", set asides and what is "owed" to them, 150 years after the emancipation proclamation and 50 years after the Civil Rights Act.

I personally haven't come into contact with anyone who's been clamoring for reparations, but I take it that you feel like African-Americans in general need to step up and do for themselves instead of complaining that nothing is being done for them. The problem with this thinking is that common issue where people like to group all African-Americans together like they are one monolithic group. There are African-Americans throughout this city that are middle class and up, own homes, and have careers. My thinking is that most people would have no problem going to a school that's majority African-American if the vast majority of the children came from families like the Obamas.

With that being said, there is a segment of the African-American community that seem to stuck in poverty, and most of blame has to be put on them for the choices that were made in life. Most are from single parent households, and have not made the choice to pursue higher education as a way to achieve a higher socio-economic status. Unless these issues are addressed and an emphasis is placed on education, this segment of the African-American community will always be where they are.

well where should they go to school before ending up exactly like their parents or the kids from my dh's ES dead pregnant addicted or in jail. Seriously. The only thing that saved him was getting out of the environment

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My grandpa got off the boat in 1910 after his parents died with nothing and struggled to make ends meet his whole life. He never spoke english well. But he pushed his kids to get educated so the poverty cycle didn't perpetuate.

At some point you gotta take responsibility and move forward.

+1. Hats off to your grandpa and your family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My grandpa got off the boat in 1910 after his parents died with nothing and struggled to make ends meet his whole life. He never spoke english well. But he pushed his kids to get educated so the poverty cycle didn't perpetuate.

At some point you gotta take responsibility and move forward.

If "You" are adults with children and "you" don't take responsibility and move forward, then it becomes a lot harder for your kids to do it. Decent public education can't make up all the difference, but it's a start. By "decent" I mean education focused on particular children's needs - not just expecting miracles using the latest, untested method on them.

It might take a while. It might not be completely successful, in terms of bringing all of them into the middle class, but it beats what happening now.