Both the Great Schools in Wake Coalition and the Coalition of Concerned Citizens for African American Children came out with press releases last week criticizing the Wake County school board majority's actions.
In the GSIW press release, the group cites a statement released last week by a group of local and national researchers such as Richard Kahlenberg of the liberal Century Foundation and Gary Orfield, co-director of the Civil Rights Project at UCLA. The researchers urge the school board to reconsider its decision to abandon the diversity policy.
"We stand with the many parents, students, teachers, civil rights activists, faith leaders, and members of the business community in Wake County who oppose the school board's decision," according to the statement from the researchers. "In the coming months, we offer our support and expertise to the district as it considers how to pursue high-quality, diverse schools that will prepare all of its students to be productive members of what we hope will be a more integrated Wake County and nation.
In the CCCAAC press release, the group blasts the board majority's recommended student assignment changes for this fall. The CCCAAC says the board majority "continues to show their efforts to promote racial and economic divide among our students, and community."
Comments
Want to see some facts
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 15:53 — stevemichaelsNot that I really give a crud - or at least I am sensible enough to want facts not a bunch of idiotic outrage - can anyone tell me how many other counties in the state currently bus kids for "economic or racial" reasons? My understanding (and I may be wrong) is the majority of the state has the students going to their "neighborhood schools" - can anyone provide an answer?
Most public schools
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 09:20 — askmisterbrownMost public schools in North Carolina are economically diverse. In the smaller towns, there is only one public high school and one public middle school, and often only one elementary school. Some counties have only one set of schools for the whole county, and students are bused much farther than in Wake County.
Economically segregated schools can be found in some of the larger towns. Mecklenburg, Wayne and Durham counties have schools with over 90% of their students living in poverty. Some of the poorest counties also have segregated schools, as the few wealthy students attend private schools.
And Wake County is also
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 11:21 — Duhhuh666And Wake County is also economically diverse. It is comprised of smaller towns and large towns, urban and rural with a variety of income levels
EVIDENCE IS CONCLUSIVE; EXPERTS AGREE
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 15:42 — askmisterbrownThe statement to which Mr. Hui refers is signed by 25 experts in the fields of education and justice, representing 11 venerable institutions across the nation, including UNC-CH, NCSU, UNCC, Ohio State, Harvard, U of Colorado, etc. It demonstrates the unity of expert opinion that the creation of high-poverty schools is inimical to the delivery of a sound education to all students.
No serious person can look at the evidence and say "high-poverty schools are just fine for kids," any more than a serious person can look at the evidence and say "climate change is a hoax."
I could easily find 25
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 16:24 — shearertwI could easily find 25 experts that agree that there is NO evidence for man-made climate change. Virtually everyone agrees that climate's do change, the cause of climate change, however, is currently under SERIOUS question by SERIOUS experts.
So....just like the chaning climate, high poverty seems to correlate with poor performance. The CAUSES and SOLUTIONS, however, are not clear and are under serious debate. What is not debatable is that busing for diversity failed, not in some far away land, but right here in WCPSS. We have decades of proof leading right up until last year's data. So let's debate the causes and potential solutions. Discussing previous "solutions" that didn't work is pointless.
This Statement Is Pure BS
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 16:42 — chaboardWhat is not debatable is that busing for diversity failed,
What I admitted to is fairly
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 16:51 — shearertwWhat I admitted to is fairly obvious that poor children perform poorly compared to rich children. There are a lot of causes for that, the least of which is the diversity of lack there of of the school they attend. Poor(er) schools have lower average scores, but that doesn't mean the individual kids in those schools would perform better at a rich(er) school. Why do you guys not get that? There is plenty of data suggesting that ED performance as not improved and has actually declined under the diverstiy policy. The burden of proof is to show that busing a kid from a poor area to a "rich" school improved their individual performance. Show me that data.
All you can show is school level trends which are meaningless.
I'll patiently wait for you individual performance data showing those test scores improving for the poor kids at the rich school.
Again You Are Stating Falsehoods As If They Are True
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 20:59 — chaboardThis statement:
All you can show is school level trends which are meaningless.
is flat out false. Both in the premise AND the conclusion.
The research is out there and it shows clearly that individuals at high-poverty schools have significantly lower test scores than individuals at other schools - even when you control for an entire slew of potential confounding variables. Heck, just to give one example, the Southworth study tracks more than 60,000 individual students right here in NC over five years and three sets of EOG tests and shows a very, very strong negative effect of school poverty concentration on individual scores. Did I mention this study is of effects on individuals? Not schools. Individuals.
The evidence is out there and anyone paying the remotest attention to this blog has all the information they need to find it. I know tha's true because I found it by following leads publicly posted here within the last couple weeks.
On the other hand - we are STILL waiting for ANYONE on your side to point us to ANY solid research on the efficacy of community schools in poor neighborhoods. Got research?
Share your link to the
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 21:35 — shearertwShare your link to the study, I'll read it for myself. I've shared tons of data on community based school systems stomping WCPSS in the ED department. No need to go there again.
Ironically, Given Your Complaint
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 21:57 — chaboardabove, all the data I've seen YOU share has focused on school level rather than individual level numbers! I don't mean that as a dig because for the most part that's the only level of raw that's available to laypeople such as you and I....but you have to admit there is some irony there.
Get me an email address somehow and I'll be happy to send you the paper so you can read it yourself. And I'd appreciate it if you'd do the same with any actual research you know of that does address the efficacy of community schools in poor neighborhoods. I've repeatedly asked for it here and no one has ever obliged with the simple common courtesy of a reference. Heck I'm willing to go dig up and access the papers on my own if needed......just give me some authors & titles to work with!
The data I shared looked at
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 11:01 — shearertwThe data I shared looked at demographic groups within schools, not whole level school vs school results. They were'nt individual data but far better than grouping the entire school into one score!
I did not present research from a published paper. I presented a series of documents and statistics from a variety of school systems that I gathered myself. That took a lot of effort I'm not inclinded to repeat as it was presented to you before.
There are not a lot of published papers regarding the performance of kids in community schools as that is in fact the norm. First, most education researchers come from a liberal stance and support social engineering such as yourself. Therefore, they're not particularly interested in studying the norm or community based schools. That doesn't mean there are not several successful community school systems in the country and I have identified many of them for you before. Please look at the performance of ED students in Houston as one prime example.
Post the author and title of the paper you have and I'll be able to get it.
So Are You Saying That There Is
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 22:04 — chaboard...no peer-reviewed research supporting the efficacy of neighborhood schools in high-poverty neighborhoods? That sure SOUNDS like what you're saying. I appreciate the data you gathered and made available to me and as someone whose done a lot of that kind of stuff on my own I certainly appreciate the effort and commitment behind it. But it's just crazy to think that kind of ad hoc data gathering can stand against thorough peer-reviewed research with high quality data and sophisticated analysis methodology.
The specific paper that I referred to is "Examining the Effects of School Composition on North CArolina Student Achievement Over Time" by
Dr. Stephanie Southworth. Let me know what you think of it....
OK chaboard. I'm having
Wed, 04/07/2010 - 10:55 — shearertwOK chaboard.
I'm having difficulty finding this paper. Is it really published in a peer reviewed journal? Perhaps its a PhD dissertation or something along those lines?
Either way, you're going to have a hard time convincing me with that paper and here's why.
Southworth is a recent graduate of the UNCC Public Policy department. It didn't take me very long to find the "group think" in this group. For example, I found another article published by Southworht appearently when she was a grad student. The other author, likely her mentor was Roslyn Arlin Mickelson. My guess is that Southworth's paper you mention was either co-authored by or highly influenced by this person (her likely grad mentor). The paper was even likely written while under her instruction. Take a look at this video I found of Dr Mickelson. (tcrecord.org/Content.asp?ContentId=15686)
Now imagine being a student under this woman and trying to conduct research that leads to any other conclusion other than DIVERSITY IS GREAT. I'm sorry chaboard, but there is ZERO credibility here.
As someone who has
Wed, 04/07/2010 - 10:00 — shearertwAs someone who has published, peer-reviewed research their own, I certainly appreciate the difference between someone gathering information and putting it together for publication. However, in the education research field, you have a "like-minded, think bubble" situation. Its very similar to the climate research situation. You don't get funding for research and publications about the natural changes in climate. Its unfortunate, but reality that the people in the academic education field are largely biased, short-sighted and stuck in an academic environment that doesn't allow for perspectives that differ from their own. All of these "social sciences" are highly subject to personal bias and interpretation. Just because it is published doesn't mean it is even remotely "correct". I have read many of the commonly cited references of the diversity proponents as a profession scientist in one of the "hard" science fields and I'm simply not impressed. When it comes to evaluating science and data, I am not a lay person. I have not taken my personal research looking into this issue lightly. I've also been very open and transparent about my data and resources. That being said, I'm also not a professional in the education field of research. However, my impression of their research is not very high. That's my personal and professional opinion. Therefore, just because my research is not published in "peer-reviewed" education literature, doesn't make it any less correct. You can of course take it or leave it. Just be skeptical of what you read from some of these "researchers" in education.
Thanks for sending the info on Southworth's paper. I'll take a look at it.
Why not stick to similar size and $/student places?
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 11:47 — user1234543 Richmond, VA MSA
44 Oklahoma City, OK MSA
45 Hartford-West Hartford-East Hartford, CT MSA
46 New Orleans-Metairie-Kenner, LA MSA
47 Birmingham-Hoover, AL MSA
48 Salt Lake City, UT MSA
49 Raleigh-Cary, NC MSA
50 Buffalo-Niagara Falls, NY MSA
51 Rochester, NY MSA
52 Tucson, AZ MSA
53 Tulsa, OK MSA
54 Fresno, CA MSA
55 Honolulu, HI MSA
You always use Houston as an
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 11:22 — danofncYou always use Houston as an example, but I really fail to see how Houston is comparable to Wake County.
I think Houston has about 2.5 times as many people (maybe more than double) in about 3/4 of the area of Wake County.
The point is, Houston has a
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 11:36 — shearertwThe point is, Houston has a much, much more challenging situation than Wake Co., yet the do much better with ED students.
Please name one school system in the US that has a similar %ED population as WCPSS, spends about the same or MORE money/student than WCPSS, DOESN'T bus and yet has lower performance within the ED population.
When you find that school system, then you can point to it and say here's the potential future consequences of not busing.....
Good luck looking......I'll wait for the results of your search (not holding my breath).
Show me the money you're
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 12:06 — danofncShow me the money you're going to use to pay performance bonuses to teachers the way that HISD does.
Show me the schools in HISD that don't have a lot of poor and minority kids, since that seems to be the norm for that district.
If Wake County was full of poor kids, the diversity policy wouldn't be an issue at all because every school would be a "poor" school.
So which is it? Is high
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 12:27 — shearertwSo which is it? Is high poverty/high minority bad for ED kids or not?
The answer is neither, its meaningless. Its what you do with the population you have that matters. That's why I always point to HISD. They spend about the same/student was WCPSS yet have much better results without busing. Why, because of all the other things they are doing to address the issues. HISD finds the money to pay performance bonuses yet spends about the same/student as WCPSS. I don't know how they do it but we should be finding out! That's my point. I'm sure HISD is not perfect but we could learn something from them to apply to our high poverty schools. We should also learn from other imperfect districts that are doing some things better than WCPSS. We need to STOP being so arrogant just b/c we won some awards from organizations that could care less about the end result and are just interested in their personal agendas being promoted. Busing is not innovative and doesn't deserve any awards, results do. Give me results over award winning "means" any day.
For 2008-09, the HISD was
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 13:02 — danofncFor 2008-09, the HISD was 81% ED.
56.7% of students in the entire state of Texas were ED.
Does Texas have the same standards as NC?
Is Houston trying to operate as many advanced programs as Wake County?
If they are putting the vast majority of their resources towards getting ED students (a significant number of whom are also labeled "at risk" by HISD) the minimums required by law, and significantly less toward "meeting the needs" of other students, where is the comparison for Wake County?
With a much smaller number of ED kids, Wake County faces a wide array of different challenges.
HISD has almost as many kids they label "at risk" as WCPSS has students. HISD has more kids who are ED than WCPSS has students.
If, after the new plan is
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 16:28 — danofncIf, after the new plan is done, scores fall for ED students, what would that prove? Would you then be supportive of going back to the current policy?
You say failed, when I think what you mean is the current system hasn't done as well as you think it should. Just remember that current performance is the baseline going forward.
So...
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 16:44 — Bob_SconceDo you mean "because" instead of just "after"? "After" could happen for any number of reasons.
Going back to the current policy would make little sense -- poor students in Wake are generally performing below the state average; we should avoid the plan that led to that situation. It would be better to find a third approach for addressing their needs.
Well, I think I mean
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 17:06 — danofncWell, I think I mean "after". I won't have any more proof that it's "because" of the new plan than any of you guys do that anything ED performance-related is "because" of the old policy "failing".
But that hasn't stopped you from blaming the old policy, has it?
So..
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 18:26 — Bob_SconceI was born after JFK was assassinated, but not because of it. I wasn't trying to get at a hard proof of causation, just pointing out that there could be other reasons and it ought to be reasonable to say, for example, "the numbers are down because the test was made a lot more difficult this year."
You are misusing causation. The diversity policy isn't the primary cause of poor students underperforming their more affluent peers. Those students underperform for a variety of reasons having to do with home situation, parental involvement, etc.... The point is that the diversity policy failed to improve their situation. We know the diversity policy didn't result in improved scores because those improved scored didn't happen.
Now, the old policy sure appears to have made things somewhat worse for at least some poor students -- you can just look at the per-school numbers to see that. But, the main claim is that it's ineffective, not that it's actively destrictive.
Well, there IS research that
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 07:32 — danofncWell, there IS research that shows that high-poverty schools produce lower-performing students. I don't think that is very much up for debate.
Promising "extra resources" is great, but it overlooks the fact that WCPSS has budget issues that are quite serious and don't seem to be going away.
"The diversity policy isn't the primary cause of poor students
underperforming their more affluent peers. Those students underperform
for a variety of reasons having to do with home situation, parental
involvement, etc.... The point is that the diversity policy failed to
improve their situation. We know the diversity policy didn't result in
improved scores because those improved scored didn't happen."
Wasn't it you that explained to me that the tests were changed a few years ago? Have scores declined a lot since then or did they drop and are now inching back up? Is the ED grad rate falling like crazy? Because of policy "failure" or because in a bad economy an ED kid is much more likely to have to get a full-time job to provide whatever support he/she can to the family?
Until there is a different policy, you (nor I) don't really know if the current policy has improved ED situations or not. It could be that without the diversity policy the gaps would be much greater. If the first couple of years of the new policy suggest that is the case, how long should we allow it to continue? I would think that since ED performance has been made the core issue that any drop in performance would result in decisive changes rather quickly.
This Is Not Yet A Valid Argument...
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 21:47 — chaboard.....because there are too many moving parts to show that "improved scores didn't happen".
If trying to compare strictly to Wake county prior to the SES change before then you have to account for massive growth, changing demographics, interference from lawsuits, massive changes imposed by the Feds with NCLB, etc, etc. (And that's assuming that it's valid to consider the SES policy as separate from the race policy - which had the same ultmate goal. Otherwise you have to show no improvement over THIRTY YEARS! Which is absurd.)
If trying to get around the time dimension by comparing to other systms (such as Charlotte) then you STILL have to account for most of those factors (different growth rates, demographics,etc) and then have to also account for at least a couple of huge new ones in addition - such as the fact that we spend a whole lot less than they do and that it's easier to "improve" from a lower starting baseline.
If you're going to try to SERIOUSLY make the argument you just stated then you need to do some serious analysis controlling for as many of these factors as possible. You obviously can't control for everything but you have to at least try to factor out the effects of the most obvious things if you want us to take the argument seriously. Until you do then the premise that your argument relies on is not demonstrated.
And on top of that I think the very structure of your argument relies on a false understanding of the diversity policy....it is NOT at bottom an attempt to improve things, it is a DEFENSIVE policy of harm avoidance. The theory is that if we PREVENT the formation of high poverty schools we can AVOID one very serious specific negative agent of negative change. You can't disprove a theory whose goal is avoidance of negative effects by looking for the absence of positive effects...it's a logial fallacy. It's like saying my dental insurance must suck because my teeth aren't any straighter than before I got the insurance.
So..
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 09:46 — Bob_SconceYes -- I recognize that definitively proving its failure takes an awful lot of work. It's conceivable, for example, that the policy improved scores but something else drove them down and that, absent the policy, scores would actually be much worse. So, you would need to gather an awful lot of data to discern what's actually going on. And, even then, there's always the possibility that you missed something. Unfortunately, that's why social scientists tend to have difficulty accepting studies that don't conform to their pre-existing biases -- rather than say "Oh. I was wrong," they say "No, that can't be right. Your study must be wrong."
As to the purpose of the policy.... It might have evolved into that, but when the district was formed in, what, 1978**, back when it was still looking at race, I believe the policy was largely intended to improve the education of black students. The prophylactic effects seemed to be a (B) argument when it turned out that the 'achievement gap' wasn't narrowing.
**IIRC, the state law mandating the change was in 1976, but the changes weren't effective until 1978.
(BTW... Have not yet read through the study, but I will.)
It's not that hard to compare is it?
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 22:17 — wireless200Why didn't WCPSS take a cohort of students that were bussed and take a representative group of students from the same demographic/geographical area who weren't bussed and compare their respective rates of acheivement. Has it been done? Is it really that difficult to produce this type of data? It would help the bussing argument. And don't just do it from one direction but, if you can find any students who were bussed from good schools to bad schools (not to magnet), what were their results? I can't imagine any parent letting their kid be bussed into violence and vulgarity, but if they exist, then produce that data.
Good Idea
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 08:23 — chaboardWill you pester the new board into commissioning a study by and providing the data to a well-respcted neutral third party?
They campaigned (correctly) on the old board's refusal tolook at this data...but since being elected they themselves have also refused.
EDITED TO ADD: But keep in mind that such a study still can't answer the question of whether the diverity policy "worked" - it can only tell you whether it did or did not have incidental positive benefits BEYOND it's main goal of harm prevention. To test if it "worked" you have to compare results that INCLUDE the high-poverty schools that it prevented from existing here in Wake County. That can be done with careful use of data from other districts controlling for confounding variables....but it cannot be done simply as you propose by only looking at data from here in Wake county.
Well, no
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 10:31 — wireless200I'm not going to "pester" them. That's what they have you for. I'm for the board's policies, support them, and think they're doing the best they can under the circumstances. But I would like to see the data. I think the fact that Burns/Delaney never made it available speaks volumes.
I don't think you have to look for an out if the data doesn't show what you want. It's a simple enough notion that, if you buy that a representative sample can be found that was bussed and one that wasn't from the same geographic nodes, and compare their achievment levels, then you can at least get a good first cut at the success or lack thereof from moving students around the county.
If it is such a good idea
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 10:28 — Duhhuh666If it is such a good idea why hasnt it been done? THe prior boards have stated how effective the policy was but didnt do anything to prove it worked? Why would you not have evidence that it works? Maybe because it doesnt.
..
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 18:59 — Dove314Trying to be sure I understand. For you, the argument boils down to busing costs time and money (~5 to 18 million are the numbers I've heard? specifically for the school system). That time and money are not producing any improvement in student achievement scores for the ED students being bused. Ergo, stop the busing and save the costs?
Uh..
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 21:18 — Bob_SconceThat's a small part of the argument. The bigger argument is that busing impedes other solutions which might actually help. Plus, trying to keep socioeconomic diversity gives the district another reason to reassign students, hurting stability. While it may be true that a relatively small number of students are bussed "For diversity," that ignores the students who are displaced when those students are bused, and then the students who are moved to make space for those students and so on.... It has the effect of multiplying reassignments.
Specifics please?
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 22:08 — Dove314What solutions were impeded? It would be good to understand these as now would seem a time to move them forward if they make sense at the current juncture.
What I mean by failed is
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 16:34 — shearertwWhat I mean by failed is that current performance of ED students has not improved. What I mean is that performance of ED students in some of our lowest ED schools is below the state average, and this is not a state you want to compare yourself to.
That being said, any policy that cannot compete with the current level of performance (that's at the individual, not school level) is a failed policy. Any policy will need some time to be implemented and for clear body of evidence to be accumulated (i.e. 10 years).
Why 10 years? The kids
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 17:01 — danofncWhy 10 years? The kids change every year, so every year should be its own sample.
What's the 10-year story on WCPSS right now? How does growth factor into it?
From 2000-2005, WCPSS opened 26 new schools. If I had to guess, I'd bet that's bigger than the majority of systems in this state.
It's ironic (I think that's the right word) that you will say the current policy has failed because ED scores haven't improved at the same time that you say that WCPSS hasn't been able to fully implement the policy (too many schools missing the 40% mark). The growth has made the policy almost impossible to achieve....but isn't it possible that the higher ED numbers in the county could be contributing to the not-good scores? Couldn't those things be related?
Couldn't it be that the current policy just needs some of the magic "special resources" that the new policy is allegedly going to have?
We have high poverty schools
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 16:02 — Duhhuh666But even with the diversity program we have high poverty schools? The no schools above 40% F and R was never realized.
Experts also agreed at one point in time that the earth was flat, the earth was the center of the universe ect..concensus does not make something true...
Keep thinking that....
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 15:48 — Bob_SconceI'll point out that there was a time when you could easily assemble 25 academics to pontificate about the benefits of eugenics. In any case, nobody's demonstrated that we'll have more "high poverty" schools than we do now. Further, considering that many WCPSS students are doing better in existing high-poverty schools than their peers in nearby "low poverty" schools, it's clear that those academics don't have all the answers.
Wrong On Two Counts
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 16:52 — chaboardOne, hasn't Tedesco himself admitted that there will be more high poverty schools? I don't have it handy but I'm certain he has. He says they'll exist but get more resources.
Two, you absolutely cannot make ANY valid statements about "WCPSS students ...in existing high-poverty schools" because by any reasonably relevant definition of "high-poverty" we either have none or have such a small number as to render statistical comparisons insignificant.
I agree with Chab.
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 17:34 — CaryCurmudgeonI agree with Chab. "High-Poverty" has no definition, so none of us should be throwing stones based on some individual's speculation on the creation of "high-poverty" schools.
Not Quite
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 21:08 — chaboardIt HAS definitions. Several of them. It's just that under most of the definitions in wide use we here in Wake county have either none or no more than a handful of such schools. Now. But we will if we don't stop Tedesco.
"It HAS definitions.
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 22:26 — CaryCurmudgeon"It HAS definitions. Several of them."
You're right. I don't know which to believe anymore. There are some counties in this country where >20% F&R would qualify as "high-poverty." In others, <60% would qualify as "low-poverty" (ie. counties which have overall >60% F&R).
So, I'm agreeing with you. The "old" standard of >40% set by WCPSS is an arbitrary number. So are any other +/- threshholds set by academic studies. None of us are empowered to define a school as "high-poverty" and none of us should be attacking individuals for creating "high-poverty" schools.
So It's Your Position
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 08:05 — chaboardthat it's wrong to call, just for example, a 75% F&R school "high-poverty"? How about a 90% F&R school? Still not kosher to call THAT high -poverty?
As the church lady would've said...."How conveeeeeenient"!
By any reasonable defintion your side WILL be creating them. Lots of them. And you know it. Pointing that inescapable truth out is not "attacking individuals". It's pointing out the consequences of public policy decisions.
And I'll also point out that at the same time that Tedesco is saying that it won't be a problem because you can devote more resources to them, you are trying to claim there will be no problem to throw more resources at. Can't have it both ways.....
Shocked
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 21:22 — Duhhuh666How can we have High Poverty Schools now, the diversity plan called for no schools to be more than 40% F&R. After 10+ years and numerous reassignment they have not been able to achieve this goal.
That was as far as White,
Mon, 04/05/2010 - 23:47 — user12345That was as far as White, Affluent, Suburban families were willing to go ... they tolerated being in schools with poor minorities if they could be separate and get special classes and they tolerated a few poor minorities being sent to their school .... but the OTB families finally reached their limit with the number of poor kids being sent to them ... so do not be shocked ... the diversity plan hit the wall when OTB, White, Affluent families reached their limit of poor minorities ...
Racist Bigot
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 08:28 — Duhhuh666User why do you have to divide people into groups? minority, poor, affluent, white, suburban, ITB, OTB... Are you a racist? are you a bigot? I see people for who they are you see them as a predetermined category. Poverty has no racial boundries, neither does wealth. My children are not to be used in a game of musical schools for your social experiments. Excuse me for wanting stability in my childrens lives.
My children are not to be
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 09:57 — user12345As a supporter of the
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 10:50 — Duhhuh666As a supporter of the government, an entity that operates on my tax dollars. It is a government of the people not a government in spite of the people. I dont think the govenment should dictate and if it does then it is time to change the government...ooh wait we did last fall...I am not on the "government dole" the government is on my dole!!! Ooh I get it not only should I give my children to you (and the government) to decide what is best, I should open my wallet and let you take all you want and not question how it is spent.
You can opt out of using
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 11:14 — user12345You can opt out of using government supplied public resources like police, fire, roads, schools, military, health clinics, etc. when ever you want. Those resources are for the common good, not your convenience. That is why we have the private sector to pander to your needs.
and we have elections to
Tue, 04/06/2010 - 11:34 — Duhhuh666and we have elections to elect people who listen to the public and not decide what is best for them. I can opt out of using the services (and so can you!), I cannot opt out of paying for them, if I am going to pay for them I will also help decide how they are used. A government by the people, ever heard of that? I prefer a government by the people to your idea of a government that decides what is best for you. I love your "you can pay for it but you dont have to use it" atitude. The school system is our school system and to say it is pandering to ask it to serve everyone is asisine.