Reply to Racial issues in DCPS for mixed race kids

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[quote=Anonymous]I'm looking for perspectives from parents of mixed race kids regarding issues of low expectations and negative peer pressure experienced by AA and Latino kids, often regardless of SES, in public schools.  I'm half black/half white and my husband is white so our soon-to-be born kid will be a quarter black.  We are house-hunting and our inclination is to buy in DC or Montco and do public schools.  But I so empathize with the concerns I've heard from parents of minority children about the public school environment.  I have first-hand experience with the problems from my own public school days (in MD, but not Montco) as a biracial kid.  Question is -- does anyone think a quarter black kid is at risk for these issues?  Kid's not here yet so don't know how brown s/he'll be, but my gut is the kid will feel and be perceived as multi-racial (or kinda like exotic?) than AA.  I know I'm trying to crystal ball this one, but I just hope to get a little insight from the masses because if people have had negative experiences with their mixed race kid akin to those with AA/Latino kids then it would affect my house-hunting and push me to private schools.

Because I can't articulate the issues I'm raising nearly as well as others have already on this board, I'm pasting below an explanation from another thread:

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Are MoCo or FFX schools in wealthy neighborhoods more diverse? Though, I don't buy the argument that some use that they go to private school because it is more "diverse."[/quote]

my kids go to Murch, our school is more diverse (both by race and SES) than Janney. I know you may not buy that argument, but I heard it first hand from an AA mom whose kid was leaving Murch for Sidwells ( of all privates!).  it was prek and there were other AA and non white students in our kids' class. she told me that her kid was leaving Murch and going to Sidwell for K. she told me that it was going to be hard on her family, but that our school did not have enough AA students and that there were more at Sidwell. she also told me (it was about 5 years ago) that, having an AA child, she was concerned about Deal and Wilson and it was important for her that her child be surrounded by successful AA models (teachers and other students). I was really surprised to hear that, but I just writing what she told me . obviously, the only diversity you find at Sidwell and other prominent private schools in DC is the one based on the color of the skin, not the SES type, but apparently for some parents, especially minority parents, it may still be important. [/quote]

This came up on another thread, but I will explain it here as well, because the poster there said that AA and Latino parents who don't want to send their kids to Wilson are just as bad as white parents who don't want to expose their kids to low SES FARMS kids.

It is a completely different thing.  Black kids who do well where there are a lot of AA low SES kids are constantly accused of acting white, being an oreo, betraying their race, denying their roots, being a traitor.  And the AA FARMS kids are sometimes a lot more vicious  to people of their own race who are different.

There is not a large Latino population, but we will not send our kids to Wilson for the same reasons.  My kids can discover their roots in college, once they have gotten in to a good one.  We are only one generation removed, and at least one of my kids might find kids in gangs etc sort of intriguing....

If they are at privates they may be asked to offer the "Hispanic" point of view on something (which is entirely stupid, because we come from El Salvador, Puerto Rico, Mexico etc), but the worst crowd they could fall into are a bunch of white stoners and drinkers and we will not let that happen because we are different from them.

This concept somehow doesn't appear to have occurred to the white folks here though - that the consequences of going to Wilson for us are a lot more dangerous than it ever could be for them - I do not see a white kid being accepted into MS 13.....[/quote]

this- Great explanation. White families, either willfully or not, rarely acknowledge/understand SES differences amongst people of color and to be honest it's not for them to understand. Everyone has their own issues so delving into intra-racial SES status amongst the various brown communities may not be top priorities for some. Understood...but as a black mom of middle class (married to a white dad- yet another layer of complexity) with my brown/multiracial children the pressures of the white world are a given. The interactions they have with other children of color from their own SES and outside are a whole other factor and frankly a much more important concern of mine. You want your child to be with social peers and not the lonely only. For brown kids lonely-onlyism can happen in an all black/brown or an all white situation in entirely different ways. The right balance needs to be struck....tightrope walking vexing, even in our post Obama world. [/quote][/quote]

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