Socioeconomic School Integration

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Socioeconomic School Integration Poverty & Race November/December 2001 Volume 10: Number 6 Socioeconomic School Integration The lead article in the Sept./Oct. P&R, by Richard D. Kahlenberg of The Century Foundation, presented an approach to racial integration of schools via a socioeconomic route. Gary Orfield, co-director of the Harvard Civil Rights Project, provided a critical commentary. (If you for some reason missed our last issue, we can send you a copy.) Given the realistic pessimism about race-based remedies, it is worth exploring other avenues. For this issue, we asked a number of additional wiseheads and activists on race and education to react to Kahlenberg’s idea. PRRAC Board members Theodore Shaw, john powell, Thomas Henderson and S.M. Miller, along with policy/media consultant Makani Themba, provide their com- ments, and the Symposium concludes with Kahlenberg’s comments on the comments. Theodore M. Shaw I join Gary Orfield’s observations ally reprehensible. Non-discrimination achieve a degree of desegregation for in response to Richard D. principles are irrevocably imbedded in a period of time, during which a judi- Kahlenberg’s article on socioeconomic America’s normative values in a man- cial snapshot would reveal a picture of school integration. I write to articu- ner that transcends the originally hypo- integration that justified judicial abso- late an analysis that may be implicit in critical Jeffersonian egalitarian vision. (Please turn to page 2) Orfield’s observations and that is ab- Americans genuinely abhor racial dis- sent or ignored in Kahlenberg’s. Both crimination. Yet they cannot let go articles failed to confront the core of of the demon of racism, especially CONTENTS: the school integration issue, whether against black people. Thus, the para- Socioeconomic it is defined by race or by class: white dox of race in America at the dawn of racism directed at people of African the twenty-first century is segregated School Integration: decent. integration: The edifice of formal A Symposium This contention flies in the face of American apartheid has been dis- Theodore M. Shaw ... 1 the prevailing contemporary liberal mantled, and black Americans have Makani Themba ........ 2 racial paradigm, which properly es- achieved a level of integration their john powell .............. 4 chews the exclusively black-white parents could only dream about, yet S.M. Miller ............... 7 analysis that has dominated race rela- racial segregation remains an intrac- Thomas Henderson .. 8 tions throughout most of American table and seemingly permanent char- Richard Kahlenberg 10 history, and it stands in direct conflict acteristic of American life. Add It Up ................... 4 with the undeniable progress achieved As a nation, we honor Brown v. New PRRAC Grant $ within the United States over the last Board of Education more in principle Available .................. 9 50 years. Most Americans undoubt- than in practice. The days of court- Lawyers’ Committee edly would subscribe to the central ordered school desegregation appear to on Civil Rights ....... 12 principle of Brown v. Board of Edu- be coming to a close. In the end, it PRRAC Update ......... 15 cation - that government-sponsored seems that enforcement of Brown v. Resources ................ 16 racial segregation and discrimination Board of Education was a process by Vol. 10 Index ............ 27 violates the Constitution’s equal pro- which school boards that practiced ra- tection clause and is otherwise mor- cial segregation were required to Poverty & Race Research Action Council • 3000 Connecticut Avenue NW • Suite 200 • Washington, DC 20008 202/387-9887 • FAX: 202/387-0764 • E-mail: [email protected] • www.prrac.org Recycled Paper (SHAW: Continued from page 1) instead of racial justice, even many attractive, the abandonment of race liberals and progressives are advocat- conscious policies is a stunning and lution. Once these school districts are ing abandonment of race-conscious unwarranted surrender. We must con- declared unitary, the judicial fiction policies and practices. They are wrong tinue to talk about the significance of goes, the causal links between past seg- because class-based policies, while race as long as race continues to be regation and discriminatory practices worthy of consideration on their own significant, and race will not become and the post-unitary status segregation merits, are not guaranteed to reach insignificant simply because we refuse attributed to residential segregation has those impacted by racial discrimina- to talk about it. been broken. Segregated demographic tion. The majority of the intended Socioeconomic school integration is patterns reflecting new population beneficiaries of such policies in this a worthy goal, but it is not a substitute growth in heavily white suburbs are country continue to be white, and for racial desegregation. Kahlenberg’s deemed to be wholly unrelated to pre- color-blind, class-conscious policies ten reasons supporting socioeconomic unitary status conditions. are not designed to reach black and school integration are indisputable; ev- The truth about school desegrega- brown people. And they are wrong eryone wants good schools and all they tion in the United States hinges on because abandonment of race-con- bring for their children. For many these two facts: 1) school desegrega- scious policies and practices is unjus- white parents, good schools are those tion, even when successfully accom- that are not too black. If we are aban- plished, has been limited in scope and doning the effort to desegregate Class-based policies are America’s public schools and if we are duration by the refusal of the majority not guaranteed to reach of white parents with school-age chil- comfortable in doing so, let’s be hon- dren to enroll them in public schools those impacted by dis- est about it. If we are not, let’s say with significant black populations; and crimination. what we do and do what we say. 2) many, if not most, white parents of Nothing in our national experience school-aged children have a level of demonstrates that public school racial tolerance for black enrollment in their tified, given the historical and continu- integration will be accomplished children’s schools beyond which they ing significance of race. There is no serendipitously. are unwilling to go, regardless of the other issue on the American agenda Theodore M. Shaw ( economic class of those black students. that we propose to address by not talk- tshaw@ , a PRRAC Board mem- Race continues to mean something ing about it. While Americans’ com- naacpldf.org) ber, is Associate Director-Counsel of within the United States. Its meaning pulsive denial of historical and current the NAACP Legal Defense & Educa- is distinct from, even if connected to, realities of race is so strongly en- tional Fund. the significance of class. Because of a trenched that the path of least resis- national weariness with issues of race tance (in Kahlenberg’s case, class) is and a misplaced vision of a civil rights struggle with a goal of color-blindness Makani Themba Poverty and Race (ISSN 1075- Richard Kahlenberg’s proposal for longing, the presence of teachers of 3591) is published six times a year socioeconomic integration might ac- color, and culturally appropriate, cul- by the Poverty & Race Research tually be the smart alternative to ra- turally relevant instruction are all im- Action Council, 3000 Conn. Ave. cial integration he asserts it is if it portant elements of quality education NW, #200, Washington, DC weren’t for one troublesome thing — that cannot be addressed without race- 20008, 202/387-9887, fax: 202/ racism. While not repeating Gary conscious remedies. The inarguable 387-0764, E-mail: info@prrac. Orfield’s fine critique of the piece, let fact is that we can never hope to org. Chester Hartman, Editor. me say that Kahlenberg appears to be achieve quality education for all with- Subscriptions are $25/year, $45/ two years. Foreign postage ex- unaware that racism is more than low out addressing racism. Socioeconomic tra. Articles, article suggestions, income or limited access, that class integration “by choice” is not only a letters and general comments are cannot be a substitute for race. Addi- poor substitute for addressing racism, welcome, as are notices of publi- tionally, the “evidence” he submits to it is an inadequate approach to address- cations, conferences, job open- support his argument has serious ing economic inequities. ings, etc. for our Resources Sec- flaws. Kahlenberg is partially correct when tion. Articles generally may be Race and class are certainly both im- he writes that the presence of a core of reprinted, providing PRRAC portant factors in education policy, but middle-class families acting as advo- gives advance permission. there are plenty of issues to be dealt cates is the “single most powerful pre- © Copyright 2001 by the Pov- with outside of the space where the two dictor of a good education.” Aside erty & Race Research Action intersect. Teacher expectations, fair from the fact that there is no single, Council. All rights reserved. student treatment, student sense of be- most powerful predictor of a good edu- 2 • Poverty & Race • Vol. 10, No. 6 • November/December 2001 cation, broad political will to do what’s as Kahlenberg suggests), high poverty separate but unequal schools within a necessary is critical to creating good schools’ administrative infrastructures school that focus the most resources schools. However, white middle-class are necessarily larger and salaries are on students with the least need. In families (and most certainly rich fami- often higher because many of these fact, inequality at magnet schools has lies) don’t have to advocate as hard or schools are in urban centers where it become such an issue that a number of as consistently for decent education as costs more to do business. Any school civil rights groups have petitioned the people of color have to. It is assumed that significantly increases its share of federal government to investigate.
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