On my post about Seattle essentially giving up on substantive racial and socioeconomic integration in its schools, commenter Traven, from Seattle, writes:
My daughter attended Laurelhurst elementary -- with by far the wealthiest PTSA -- for a year (because she couldn't get in to another elementary, which was actually closer to us). A couple of dozen kids on half a dozen buses came from other parts of town -- some spent an hour on the bus each way. But at the end of the day, you could count the number of minority kids at Laurelhurst on the fingers of your hands. In the end, millions have been spent on transportation for very little result. So I have reluctantly concluded that the pursuit of diversity -- though I still think it's a nice goal -- needs to take a backseat to spending all those millions on improving local schools.
That would be a fine compromise...if there was any evidence at all that separate schools for poor kids are equal schools. To the contrary, studies in Louisville and other districts around the country have found that poor kids attending middle class and upper middle class schools perform better than poor kids attending schools where most children are living in poverty or close to it. Here in Washington, D.C., it is a well known fact that our school system is a mess and that children are being left behind at astounding rates, even though spending per pupil is roughly equivalent to that in nearby suburbs. The problem? Ninety-three percent of public school students in D.C. are black, Latino, and overwhelming poor; only about 5 percent are white. Those white children are concentrated largely in one neighborhood -- Upper Northwest -- and in a few highly regarded charter schools elsewhere.
District regionalization would do wonders for promoting educational equality in D.C. and cities like it nationwide. Read commenter weboy's eloquent musings on the topic.Being reflexively anti-busing is to close one's eyes to the proven benefits of integrated schooling. That's not to say there aren't many, many reforms that would make the schools serving poor kids better schools. We should work hard to get those kids better teachers, better supplies, better buildings, and better administrative management. But integration should be part of any long-term discussion about reforming our schools. There's proof that it works.
--Dana Goldstein
