Reply to Eliot-Hines Middle School

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous] In theory, I completely agree.  And if you were starting from scratch, it would be easier, but as it stands, you need guinea pigs---alot of them.  You need people who are ok traveling into an area where the prospect of crime is probably much higher than where they live, just a few blocks away.  You need white people who are ok with their child going to a school that completely lacks diversity.  I can't imagine it would be easy being white in an all-black DC middle school, especially when you likely come from a privileged background.  (A few bad apples, etc., obviously, but it was by no means uncommon for me to see kids from the former Hine harrassing (white) passers-by.)  My point is simply that people of all races are more likely to feel comfortable when they see people who look like them.  You also need people to invest in improving a school even though it won't truly be a neighborhood school to them.  People talk about Brent as an example of how quickly a school can change when you have committed parents, but it is much easier to commit when the school is in your backyard.[/quote]

I can but assume that you haven't taken the time to tour Eliot-Hine to portray it as something that needs to be gutted and shut down, even just figuratively. Before you make assumptions based on a few encounters with obnoxious teenagers from a school that closed years ago, maybe it's time to check it out, talk to some of the teachers there, check out the library, meet with the principal, take a tour and all, well, heck speak with some of the kids and ask them about those comments.
On the race piece: From having been that "pioneer", as someone called it euphemistically a few posts up, I know that the fear is real and belittling it and chastising people for bringing it up is of no use. Our city and school system have got to find tools to turn this into an asset rather than a contention. Meanwhile, let me tell you that if you had the courage, you will learn how little a deal that actually is. You'll learn to look closely and find that you have so much more in common with some people who don't look like you than you have with some people who do.

To your comment about a new school: For anyone absolutely eager to start a new school, go right ahead, there are several middle school projects all around the city being or about to be started up. I for one would be much more concerned about being a guinea pig of a start-up than of something that I can inspect and see that it actually works. Is all shiny and rosy? Of course not, or we wouldn't be having these conversations. But you may have experienced how actually really quite little it takes if everyone stopped even just undermining. Just imagine the limitless possibilities if we actually worked together, I mean everybody.
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