Reply to African Americans in Top Montgomery County Elementary Schools

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]]I am not the PP you are quoting, but I have never seen a white parent on DCUM asking about sending their child to a school where white kids are only 5-10% of the school population. I have seen posts from parents who are scared to send their kids to a school where whites are less than the majority, and I do question that. But there is a huge difference between a child being one of 30-40% and a child being the only one in the class. [b]I don't recommend that experience for any young child - black, white, asian, whatever[/b].

[/quote][/quote]

NP here.  My own African American child attended an MCPS elementary with only 2 other black students.  Because the school/MCPS/? seems to have a policy of "balancing" the classroom make-up and there were two classes per grade level, 1 of the the 3 black kids always ended up in a class by his/herself (including my child).  I haven't seen any evidence that my child (or the other 2) were harmed by the experience of being the only one or a pair of blacks in the class.  So I'm curious as to why you think this?  It seems to me that the [b]younger the child[/b], the less relevant race/lack of diversity has been to their school experience -- at least that has been my experience (i.e., while these kids bring diversity to their school, they are not [i]integrating[/i] it -- their experience is nothing that of Ruby Bridges, Little Rock 9, etc.).       [/quote]

I am the person you quoted. I guess it depends on how you define harmed. I was one of those "onlies" as a child, and I am sure my parents would have said I wasn't harmed. I did very well academically, and I am very successful now. But I really struggled socially and emotionally, and felt painfully different at times. And it impacted my racial identity. Having a black family did not make up for the isolation I felt during the school day. To this day, I struggle and have to make an effort to connect and form deep friendships with other black women. I still feel different, like there is some set of social rules that I did not learn growing up. And I know white adoptive parents who are raising their children in otherwise exclusively white environments. Those kids don't even have the benefit of seeing themselves reflected at home.

If being the only black child were the only way for my children to get a good education, then I would feel better about it. But in this area, it simply isn't necessary to put my children in that position.[/quote]

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