Choosing Progress
This week’s readings focused on the fight for fair and equitable educational policies, with Nikole Hannah-Jones shedding light on the gray area where parents are forced to choose whether to push further for the success of their own children or to push for the overall success of their community.
Nikole Hannah-Jones and her husband, Faraji, faced their “toughest decision since becoming parents” when they were choosing a school for their 4 year old daughter to attend. They were both middle-class black parents who obviously wanted the best opportunities for their daughter. They had both gone to public schools that had offered them unique experiences as black students (an unsegregated Army base classroom and the “best” public white school through a desegregation program) and wanted their daughter to have the same transformative experience through integration. However, Hannah-Jones knew that middle-class families of color leaving lower-income and lower-scoring schools only contributed to this problem and widened the gap. Hannah-Jones explained, “I understood that so much of school segregation is structural — a result of decades of housing discrimination, of political calculations and the machinations of policy makers, of simple inertia. But I also believed that it is the choices of individual parents that uphold the system, and I was determined not to do what I’d seen so many others do when their values about integration collided with the reality of where to send their own children to school.”
Hannah-Jones’ story brings light to much larger-scale issues regarding the systems and structures that make some schools “better” than others, and exposes the ways modern-day discrimination and segregation begin as early as the elementary school level. Having experienced the effects of federal resegregation firsthand she explains,“By 1988… school integration in the United States had reached its peak and the achievement gap between black and white students was at its lowest point since the government began collecting data. The difference in black and white reading scores fell to half what it was in 1971, according to data from the National Center for Education Statistics. (As schools have since resegregated, the test-score gap has only grown.) The improvements for black children did not come at the cost of white children. As black test scores rose, so did white ones.” This is only some of the evidence in the article that concludes integration yields progress.
So why have we opted to turn this progress around and push for resegregation? Hannah-Jones explains, “Integration as a constitutional mandate, as justice for black and Latino children, as a moral righting of past wrongs, is no longer our country’s stated goal. The Supreme Court has effectively sided with Reagan, requiring strict legal colorblindness even if it leaves segregation intact, and even striking down desegregation programs that ensured integration for thousands of black students if a single white child did not get into her school of choice.” These actions have disadvantaged thousands of students of color from childhood, have led to the construction of the “school to prison pipeline,” has resulted in lower education levels, lower incomes, and lower budgets… Hannah-Jones’ plethora of evidence, research, and statistics deliver her message clearly and powerfully. One can also see how these injustices push individuals and groups to say “enough is enough!” After hearing these stats and considering the dozens of schools that were closed in Chicago it is much easier for me to feel the anger, frustration, and motive of those involved in the Chicago Teachers Union strike.
After looking through our community partner demographic statistics in class I have wondered what degree the students at Venetia Valley are being disadvantaged by seemingly segregated schools. According to the website data, 80–90% of Venetia Valley students are Hispanic/Latino, 80% are on free/reduced lunch, and 60% are English language learners. These factors often correlate to lower standardized test scores, so does this mean that VV is recieving lower funding because of this? One of my teachers there, Ms. Avalos, told me that most students need to be driven to school because they come from across town. This also makes me wonder how VV compares to other schools in the area in terms of being “better” or “worse.” I have had much to think about and ponder in regards to my community partner and I am hoping to learn more this week.
