Brown vs Board : revisited?

Parent Cafe
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<p>So the Supreme court is going to hear Seattles take on school assignment today.
Personally- as a parent who has been not happy with SPS over the years- I am pretty fed up that the district has spend hundreds of thousands of dollars over the past few years bringing this case to court and appealing the decisions. ( some magistrates/courts have sided with district, others have sided with parent group)</p>

<p>I am more interested in education for all kids now.</p>

<p>The district has 40% Caucasian students & 60% minority ( including Asian- AA- Latino & Native Americans)-
The city has roughly 29% minorities ( 19%immigrants) and 71% Caucasian.</p>

<p>So clearly a couple things are going on.
One is that Seattle as a city, is not as diverse racially as their more affluent neighbor -Bellevue across the lake.
Bellevue has a better reputation education wise & minority families who have means and motive often move to Bellevue from Seattle or from their home country after researching area.
( as do Caucasian families)</p>

<p>The numbers of families with children in Seattle is almost as low as that of San Francisco, with the lowest ratio in country ( in urban areas)</p>

<p>1/4 of those children are not in Seattle public schools, but are home schooled or attend private.</p>

<p>It is ironic to me- that at the same time that Seattle schools are considering ( and have begun the process somewhat) of reducing school transportation, ( they spend much more than what the state will subsidize), in order to bring dollars back to the buildings, they want to be able to assign students by race & not by neighborhood.
( and although no neighborhood is completely segregated by race- there are neighborhoods that attract more Asian families for example Beacon Hill, or neighborhoods that are more Caucasian, like Laurelhurst and around the UW.)</p>

<p>There are large sections of the city, that do not have a local high school at all. Students from these neighborhoods were not assigned to the closest school ( because the closest school was not close enough to be considered a neighborhood school), instead they were assigned a school that was at the edge of the district,impacting their ability to participate in afterschool activities and for their parents to attend school functions.</p>

<p>There are usually not yellow buses for high school students, and the area of downtown where you have to transfer is not someplace I would want my 14 year old to have to be in the dark of a morning.
( the Seattle bus system is also not very well set up- its great if you want to go downtown or the the University- not so good if you want to go anywhere else)</p>

<p>If the Seattle school district, was actually concerned that the district was becoming more segregated, as they should be, being it doesn’t reflect the city population, they could have assigned by income, without being taken to court.</p>

<p>I agree that we have disportionality in the schools, There are poor schools without a PTA, without strong leadership and the kids are suffering. But assigning caucasian students to those schools, that have openings because neighborhood students have chosen other schools that might have been a little farther away but have better programs- is that really a way to bring equity in education?</p>

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<p>"But assigning caucasian students to those schools, that have openings because neighborhood students have chosen other schools that might have been a little farther away but have better programs- is that really a way to bring equity in education?</p>

<p>The answer to this is an obvious “yes”. (If it wasn’t, they wouldn’t be in court.) As you wrote, children in certain neighborhood schools are chosing other schools because they have better programs. The question, which is rather more narrow, is whether this is both an allowable and desirable mechanism.</p>

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<p>right and I am referring to those neighborhoods which have schools that are underenrolled- because in historically Caucasian neighborhoods like Queen Anne & Wallingford- high schools have been closed over the past 20 years, or Magnolia which has never had a high school, students are being assigned to schools over 10 miles away to neighborhoods that haven’t had high schools populations consolidated with the loss of students from the district.
Some of the schools don’t even have 600 students- even though virtually all of the buildings can accomodate over 1000. Since they have WSF would’t it be a better way to spend the money if they perhaps closed one building and put the money back into the schools? With more students the building gets more financial support I agree, more teachers, more classes, but if they continue to assign students whose families wanted their kids to go to their closest school, to schools 10 miles away, they are going to continue to hemmorage students-</p>

<p>When we assign students to schools that are 10 miles away & which only can be reached by taking 2 or 3 city buses, we limit students opportunities for after school support, including tutoring, sports and other extra curriculars.
We require students to spend more time getting to & from, limiting their available time for homework, working after school and seeing their family and friends.
Parents who live more than 10 miles from the school, are less likely to be involved in the school community and because the district has to spend money on transportation whether it be by yellow or city bus, it reduces the amount of money that is available for programs
The largest difference I have seen in school performance are in schools where parents are encouraged to participate in school activities, whether that be driving on field trips or helping in the classroom.
By making the school up to an hour away in light traffic by car, when many parents don’t have private transportation, you are fighting against what should be our priority, giving all kids an appropriate education</p>

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<p>

Huh? I’m not sure I follow the logic of this statement? Is the assumption that because the schoolboard took it to court that they by definition know what is correct? This from mini the cynic of all things governmental? </p>

<p>Also, I wonder if it is the “programs” that are attracting students away from the neighborhood schools or the environment? I am very familiar with one of the poorest/non-diverse school districts in our state. The overall achiement in this district is extremely poor. However, within any given classroom there are only a handful of students whose parents value education enough to take the initiative to move their kids to another district if offered the choice. </p>

<p>Were they to be offered the choice, thus providing vacancies, I can’t imagine a worse solution to the environment than to fill these vacancies with random white kids from outside the area. It would be condemning these kids to try to achieve an education in an environment that is unsuitable for education. This is not because of race or facilities or teachers, but because the “local” peer group for the bussed-in students would be those whose families have no regard for education. </p>

<p>I’m not sure what the solution is, but the “solution” as I understand it is truly terrible and I’m sure that any parent who values education for their children would fight having their kids sent into a grossly underperforming environment such as this.</p>

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<p>I just read the hard copy Wall Street Journal story about the Seattle/Louisville desegregation case. The plaintiffs in Seattle aren’t depicted very favorably. Then again, the School District officials are described as wimpering autocrats who easily get weak in the knees when confronted by intimidating parents.</p>

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<p>"Then again, the School District officials are described as wimpering autocrats who easily get weak in the knees when confronted by intimidating parents.</p>

<p>Sounds accurate to me.</p>

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<p>Have any of you Seattleites read about the Louisville school plan? I’m not a big fan of bussing for all the reasons that have been mentioned, not a great magnet school fan either, for similar reasons - magnet schools are the deseg tool of choice around here. The Louisville plan, if I at all understand it, seems almost reasonable, and has apparently led to net gains in attendance for the public schools, vs flight to private.</p>

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<p>Identifying people based on their race and then allocating government resources (school assignments) based on their race is the ultimate act of racial discrimination. It is prohibited by the U.S. Constitution (equal protection law, etc.) yet Supreme Courts of the past have sanctioned it. When the Supreme Court sanctioned busing in the past, busing was a complete failure and shows why court should not try to legislate. I suspect this Supeme Court will rely on bad precedent and screw things up again.</p>

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<p>What annoys me about this case most, is that it seems to ignore the entire issue of Brown v. Board of Education. Everyone (well, most everyone) will agree that Brown v. Board of Education was a great step foward for equal rights in America. But the people who want to take race out of school assignments seem to imply that the problem that Brown v. Board was correcting was not that schools were segregated, but that we were admitting that they were segregated. </p>

<p>This is absurd of course, segregated schools help no one. Not the white students, not the black students, nobody. If the only way to keep schools from reverting back to pre-1954 levels (like they are in many places in the country), is to bus students to another part of town, well, then so be it.</p>

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<p>This is the same school board that fails to close 3/4-empty schools and consolidate the remaining students in fewer schools. “Gutless” barely begins to describe the Seattle school district board. It takes courage to close a school, but it doesn’t take much in the way of brains to figure out that paying to keep extra schools open uses money that could be spent on something like, I don’t know?, maybe, education? Perhaps Congress’ base-closing commission could tackle the Seattle schools problem in their spare time?</p>

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<p>Yes they can keep bussing until the last white kid goes to private school–then what??</p>

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<p>Let’s think about this. A bunch of unelected judges throughout the nation ordered hundreds of thousands of people to change their schools because of their race. Forced desegregation was one of the most outrageous examples of abuse of judicial power in the history of our country. The goal of having mixed clases and communities was certainly an admirable goal, but the method of having a few unaccountable people decide the method to achieve that goal has had horrible consequences on the balance of power seth forth in our Constitution.</p>

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<p>razorsharp, is your post supposed to be a joke or something?</p>

<p>You think a kid having to travel a little further to get to school is more important than racial equity?</p>

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<p>

You might want to brush up on your history. In some cases it was a little farther but in many cases it meant several hours were added to a child’s travel time. I am not suggesting the courts failed to act of good intention. In fact I think they were trying to solve a problem. My objection is that the method they chose was to exclude legislative bodies better suited to make these decisions. The Court’s rule in Brown was correct – in essense that there was racial discrimination by prohibiting one race from attending a specific school. The Court should have ruled that way and left it at that. Instead, the Courts tried to solve the problem by imposing their own judgement as to what is the best solution. As history has shown their solution was stupid which is often true when solutions are shoved down the throats of the public. If the solution had been made by legislators, I believe integration would have been better accepted and may have worked. It may have taken legislators longer to act, but their solutions would have been more realistic and ultimately accepted as the will of the people.</p>

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<p>I’m not sure what you mean, unless you mistyped “equality.” If that is true, is the only way to insure equality to take a child out of his or her neighborhood, make them spend two or three hours a day riding a bus to go to school with strangers? Is the only way to insure equality guaranteeing that a student cannot ever participate in after-school activities? Is the only way to insure equality eliminating the chance for students to participate in “zero period” activities like Jazz Band? Is the only way to insure equality to make sure children will never go to school with other kids in their neighborhood, or church, or Scout troop, or Little League team, or dance class, or community center?</p>

<p>Bussing for racial equality was an unqualified failure in every way. This is why it is virtually unknown in the US today. If you would like to offer any empirical evidence as to the benefits of cross-town racial-equality bussing I’m all eyes.</p>

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<p>Seattle is a district that already does not represent the city.
While this has always been a pretty liberal area- where we voluntarily bused in the 1970s, where we don’t have “ghettos” and where public housing is attractive and blends in with the neighborhood as do the inhabitants, we also reflect the Scandinavian roots and are about 69% Caucasian ( the city- not the district)
Our racial balance has been broadened by not only Asian Americans, who have often been here for generations, but by Somali, and Kurds and Fijians. et.al.
However,Bellevue a city to the east, is actually more diverse ( 32% minority) and their school district better serves their residents as a higher % of Bellevue residents opt for public schools.
IN Seattle 1/4 of students don’t attend public schools, while the city is 69% white, the district is only 40 % white.
So should the schools look like the city or the district?
These students weren’t just denied entry to their top choice school, they were denied entry to any of the schools they chose and were assigned ( in some of the cases that I know about that aren’t party to the lawsuit) to the furthest building from their home.
Its been mentioned buildings are more than 1/2 empty, it is true.
I don’t see, how at school consolidation meetings, tempers flare and sound bites are recorded as emotional testimony is declared to the good these schools do.
However, for several years, schools have been struggling, and resources are thin. When a school has only THREE families choosing that school first, ( and is so for several years) it seems that for some reason, that school is not meeting the needs of students.
Did they redraw boundaries so that more families would fall in the neighborhood? ( no) Did they promote programs to attract more families to the school ( well they tried, area families introduced a montessori program into the building that was well received by some- but those who were listened to called it racist-)
How can a school that barely has 100 students, have enough money to pay a principal and a janitor, to keep the heat on & buy books?
Consolidate that school with another closeby school, and students parents and teachers have more resources- but because the name of the school is Martin Luther King, that is a racist idea.
do people really think that it is honoring his name to insist that kids attend school in a building that is more than half empty?</p>

<p>Or take the African American Academy. An honorable idea- but it is segregated-94% of students are African American- no special education is offered at all, which I was under the impression was illegal in a public school. 84% of students are low income.
Two girls next door attended for a few years, but while an average of 30% of students passed all three sections of the 4th grade washington test, less than 10% of students passed it in 7th grade.
They are bright kids, they want to go to their neighborhood school, and because they are black, in a neighborhood that reflects the city population of 69% white , they can go to their neighborhood school.
But because Seattle wants the schools to reflect the district, not the city, its likely that by the time they get to high school, their white friends who live down the street, will be assigned to a school 10 miles away, while they are able to go a few blocks.</p>

<p>Does a diverse district reflect the city or does it segregate itself by the choices that are made?</p>

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<p>Did I miss something? I don’t believe that a major complaint of the Seattle plaintiffs is busing. The plaintiffs argue that they were excluded from their preferred school because of their race. In other words, the complaints have no problem with long rides to school if they are awarded their first choice.</p>

<p>Also, you outsiders (non-Puget Sound region residents) whom expressed perfunctory opposition to the Seattle plan are not familiar with the unique factors regarding schools and integration in Seattle.</p>

<p>Seattle is (at least it was) probably one of the most integrated metropolitan regions in the U.S. Specifically, south end neighborhoods were integrated. But since the 1970s, the school district population has fallen significantly (begining prior to busing). Thus Kitty’s explanation of the demographics is accurate; a largely white city has a majority of non-whites in the public school population. No there is no substantial (plentiful) east coast type of alternative system of parochial and private/prep schools. Another twist in the segregation debate is that Garfield High School, situated in a middle-class Black neighborhood is in high demand because today it is reputed one of the best public high schools on the west coast. In my day, whites in Garfield’s attendance area ran from the school.</p>

<p>The big problems for the SPS are declining enrollment as families of all ethnicities move to the suburbs were housing is more plentiful and moderately less expensive; the residential segregation of the north end and the poor standing of the south end high schools, particularly Rainier Beach High School, which statistically should be one of the largest schools in Seattle but is not nearly full (it is the least preferred high school) but stands admist a neighborhood full of expensive waterfront homes.</p>

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<p>“The plaintiffs argue that they were excluded from their preferred school because of their race. In other words, the complaints have no problem with long rides to school if they are awarded their first choice.”</p>

<p>That’s the way I understand it as well. The plaintiffs are PRO busing, and are complaining that they are denied the opportunity to ride the bus, and to miss out on all those wonderful afterschool opportunities. (Which isn’t to say the school district is trying to defend the importance of the latter.)</p>

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<p>* Rainier Beach High School, which statistically should be one of the largest schools in Seattle but is not nearly full (it is the least preferred high school) but stands admist a neighborhood full of expensive waterfront homes.*</p>

<p>Rainier Beach is in a very nice neighborhood, that has gone through several transitions- I believe they must have a large Jewish population for instance, going by the offerings at the grocery store across the street.</p>

<p>For several years, my daughters school ( as did a couple other schools) used the very nice field facilities at Rainier Beach, for meets and practice, until the principal revoked that privilege and they were forced to again run track on the sidewalks in the neighborhood,( which is bad its practically a recipe for shin splints) after too many incidents involving firearms occured in and around RB high school.</p>

<p>I agree that the parents in Ballard who have the district dispute put it as it wasn’t their first choice school or even listed at all- however at meetings I have attended, they have argued that they wanted their kids to attend school close enough so that they could attend sporting events and other activities easily. I also think that when the district looks at assigning by race to schools that better reflect the district quotas, they need to consider that the money spent on busing, might be better used to beef up programs.</p>

<p>I also agree that if they took the APP students from Garfield and moved all of them to Rainier Beach, many of the families would follow.
But do you know what a PITA it is to get to Rainier Beach? ;)- </p>

<p>I believe that the district is looking at changing the current preferential assignment for APP students to Garfield- * over the neighborhood students*, which I agree with. The district could support two buildings that offer a great number of AP classes, just as they now have two buildings that have the IB program. I don’t know about the IB program, but just having AP classes in the building brings interest and support that other non AP students can benefit from.</p>

<p>I hope that they are able to help the community get on board with Trish Dzikos TAF program at Rainier Beach. I think that would attract a lot of families to the school, my daughter worked with Trish when she was at CityYear & I have sat on committees with her, and I think she sees pretty clearly what is needed to be done.
This is Seattle, we never are going to get 100% agreement on anything, but I feel like beating my head against the wall when I see how much energy is being expended and little to show for it.
If they could build enrollment at RB, then they could staff the Langston Hughes Arts complex that isn’t fully available to students the way it is.</p>

<p>Neighborhoods change, the area around Garfield used to be Jewish, then black and now it is pretty middle class and diverse- my mother used to walk to Garfield in the 50s- I think is pretty cool that my D and her grandma attended the same school & I wish we were able to have bought my great aunts house at the foot of Yesler ( they had torn down my mothers house when they rebuilt the elementary school), but even 20 years ago, it was more than we could afford. Nice area though.</p>

<p>Rainier beach is a pretty nice area as well, while the families I know who live there have their kids at Garfield or in private school ( mixed families), I think if there was a really attractive program like TAF, they would enroll their kids.</p>

<p>I like the diversity, but more middle class families are being pushed out of Seattle, how is it going to help the city and the schools if all we have left living here are young couples, who move when they have kids- families who have their kids in private schools, and those who are excessively stubborn &/or too poor to move.
<a href=“http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=black22m1&date=20010722[/url]”>http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=black22m1&date=20010722&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>The bottom line for me I think is that Seattle( district) wants to see itself as * for diversity* but they don’t want to actually have to measure results so they can see if their expensive efforts are affecting the change that want.
Personally, I think * that * is racist, because if it sounds good, but isn’t actually * doing* good, then what is the point?</p>

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<p>I am going to have to think about this somemore- since the decision made by the court will affects schools across the country.
I admit I have been totally self absorbed in thinking about how it has been distracting Seattle from getting on with the business of educating kids- not operating as a work program for adults .
reading articles about other urban districts, Detroit, Philidelphia, Boston- I am really stymied at the persistent difficulties we still face.</p>

<p>Seattle is different- logistically from some of these districts, as the district geographically mirrors the city- one city, one district.</p>

<p>We also have seen a lot of movement between neighborhoods ethnically, and even good diversity I think economically. We don’t have ghettos as might be found in other cities, and while we do have race related crime- when someone targets someone of another race, it seems that the bottom line is that they are mentally ill, & it is abarrant behavior, not that there is generalized outward hostility toward those who happen to have a different skin tone.</p>

<p>My D attended a school that was open to all kids, from all parts of the city and is K-12. She had 3 best friends at that school, who not by design lol- happened to live in the 3 corners of the city that we did not!.</p>

<p>But I think it was great experience for that- and while distance was difficult, and it did impact some families ability to participate in school events-I would encourage the district to find a way to have more opportunities for students * before* high school to attend schools outside their immediate neighborhood. ( but hopefully without having to bus them 10 miles- even my Ds busride was over an hour each way- really exhausting for her)</p>

<p>In high school, I would really like to see stronger schools, with clear identities, and for parents and * students* to have more say over what school they attend. High school is a time to really develop interests, which is vital toward keeping students interested in school & I think that is more important than if the student sitting next to them speaks amharic or french.</p>

<p>In elementary and middle school is where walls really need to be lowered, its much easier for families to get to know one another when kids are in 4th grade, than 11th. I think it is also easier for kids and families to have shared interests when younger- my D was much more open to hanging out when she was younger with her friends, but now her friends are more aligned with her interests, which is one reason why I would support high schools with stronger identies, to help kids pursue those interests.</p>

<p>Not for the district to be divided between vocational and academic high schools for example-
but for instance Aviation high school ( which is temporaily located in Seattle but it is part of the Highline district), attracts students who are interested in aviation and aerospace, whether they ultimately will attend college right after high school, or be ready to go right to work.

  • myself- I am not so interested in airplanes, but if my husband had been able to attend a school like that, he might have even attended college, because it would have been something he could relate to and be excited about.
    But when you are attending a comprehensive high school, and havent been engaged much in your academic classes- and the only one you even stay in school for is metal shop ( which has been cut in many areas), then college just seems like 4 more years of torture.</p>

<p>I don’t know why we can’t have something like that- in Seattle :confused:
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