"Hard evidence shows that students of all races can succeed or fail in schools that are racially mixed or racially unmixed." But sending kids across town in buses that pass nearby schools in order to achieve "racial balance" can only produce hardships and disrupt scholarly efforts. No evidence shows that "integrated" schools produce better scholarship. To the contrary, many all-black, all-white, all-Asian, and all-Indian schools produce the world's best average test scores. But so do many integrated schools. Instead of focusing on forcing integration, let's focus on forcing serious academic efforts. Let integration take care of itself, except in cases where discrimination occurs.
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Not only is bussing bad, but integration itself has been called "a trick bag" by a historian friend of mine.
Black schools prior to integration suffered from woeful lack of funding (not unlike the current situation), but based on talks I've had with my elders, I learned that the community controlled segregated schools offered a more nurturing environment for students.
There is a disparity of funding between Black schools and white schools to this day. Bussing students from the inner city to the suburbs or vice versa does not present an answer because long commutes tend to rob students of energy needed for educational activity.
I heard Tavis Smiley say this years ago, but he has since dropped the call. I think Reformed Leftist should take it up.
There should be a Constitutional amendment guaranteeing an equal, high-quality education for all students regardless or socio-economic status, race, location, gender, creed or culture. This should be accomplished through a variety of means including, but not limited to
-improved funding of all public schools
-drastic reforms in curriculum, standards and testing
-drastic reforms in teacher qualifications
-a purging of many public education boards (starting with Detroit Public Schools)
-school vouchers which I would only support if measures were taken to improve local schools in all areas.
Sowell's and Hue's support of vouchers but their disdain of bussing is counter intuitive. The reason students are bussed is supposedly racial. The Brown v. Board decision was racial.
Vouchers are only a stop-gap measure. The real solution is to make all schools better schools. Students shouldn't have to go across town to find a better school for educational or racial reasons.
So forget over 50 years of Supreme Court decisions. All students regardless of where they live, who their parents are, what color their skin is, whether they play sports or not, no matter what gender they are, should be provided a high-quality education that is commiserate with the life challenges they will face because of their socio-economic status or neighborhood.
You with me, Paul?
I grew up in integrated schools, first in the military, in my small hometown, and in college. It was a positive experience for the most part because I had decent schools and a high level of parental involvement.
The racial integration was positive because we live in a multi-cultural society. I found the social education to be helpful as long as I was in majority white settings.
Where I have found more difficulty is dealing with all Black situations. Because I grew up within white-dominated areas, I had to learn to adapt to Black folks, if that makes sense.
This acculturation was more than racial, however, because it has been mostly an adjustment from my rural, small-town upbringing to an urban, big city reality. I have many shared cultural experiences with urban blacks, but not as many as I have with rural whites.
So in that regard, integration has been a double-edged sword as well. How different would that have been in a rural, all-black setting? Pretty different, I would imagine. But still not the same as the urban experience...
Nadir writes: =================
Black schools prior to integration suffered from woeful lack of funding (not unlike the current situation)
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I think that we have already proven that today black schools to *NOT* suffer from a lack of funding. In the Detroit metro area, the black schools get more funding that most of the suburban white government schools. Don't you remember the presentation of these facts, Nadir? The lowest-performing HS in the area is Inkster, and it also gets more funding than any other HS. That's just one of the amazing facts that we discussed.
And of course, which is the nation's highest-funded government school system? DC, of course. It also counts as just about the worst-performing.
Nadir writes: ======================
There is a disparity of funding between Black schools and white schools to this day.
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Where are you getting this from? The facts refute this claim, as best as I can tell.
Nadir writes: ===================
Sowell's and Hue's support of vouchers but their disdain of bussing is counter intuitive.
Vouchers are only a stop-gap measure. The real solution is to make all schools better schools. Students shouldn't have to go across town to find a better school for educational or racial reasons.
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["bussing" = kissing; busing = riding a bus]
Vouchers would not result merely in black students having the capacity to go across town to enroll in nice private schools. It would also enable people like you and me, Nadir, to create excellent, small private schools in poor black neighborhoods.
Currently Detroit schools get about $12k/year for each student (much more than most honkey govt schools get!). For classrooms with 15 kids, that's $180/year. You don't think with that much money we couldn't produce average scores that beat the honkies in the suburbs? If we paid each teacher $100k/year (including benefits), that's still $80k/year for each classroom.
We could eschew sports and electives, mandate enthusiastic behavior as a requirement for attendance, and implement an all-academic curricula delivered exclusively by people with scholarly credentials. Go black folks!
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