Powell demonstrates the ways that sprawl have reinforced racial segregation. In Powell’s study, he outlines how sprawl has enabled inter district segregation even if the civil rights movement addressed intra-district segregation. Others, like Rothstein demonstrated the ways that the legacy of redlining has created continued segregation and a racial caste system in our country. In both cases, these scholars demonstrate the ways that government policies have explicitly perpetuated legal segregation. There is perhaps no place where that segregation has had a bigger effect on determining potential for success than in our school systems. Continued segregation of our education system has perpetuated this racial caste system.
New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio recently unveiled a plan to increase diversity in New York’s elite public schools. The backlash from white parents, even from many supposed progressives, demonstrates the difficulty of dismantling this systemic inequality. The plan would change admissions policies at the elite public schools so that the top 7% of performers at each public middle school would receive admission, rather than basing admission on test scores. The plan is similar to what Texas has applied to the University of Texas, where they admit the top 10% of performers from Texas public schools. Currently, Black and Hispanic Students make up just 10% of seats at specialized high schools, despite making u 67% of the public school population. De Blasio claims that if all his proposed reforms are passed, 45% of students at New York’s specialized schools would be black or Latino.
That modest plan has faced significant backlash from white parents, many of whom have tried to justify their objections through paternalistic concern for minority students facing stigmas for unfair admission. NYU professor Jonathan Haidt said “If this proposal is enacted, we are going to increase the racism and prejudice of our kids in the specialized high schools. Put yourself in the place of black and Hispanic kids who are there because of accounting methods.” Many white parents have expressed “concern” for these minority students who they claim would not be prepared to succeed at the more selective schools.
As De Blasio’s proposal faces resistance from upper-class parents, some New York communities have taken a more local approach to desegregation efforts. In Brooklyn School District 15, which includes Park Slope, Carroll Gardens, Sunset Park and Red Hook, approved a plan to designate a share of seats in selective middle schools for students from low income or homeless families.
Resistance to De Blasio’s efforts to integrate schools demonstrate that schools, particularly selective ones, remain racialized spaces. Bottom-up organizing, like what we see in Brooklyn District 15 may be the only effective way to overcome the systemic segregation that remains in our public schools.
Sources:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/parents-vehemently-oppose-mayors-plan-to-change-admissions-at-citys-elite-public-high-schools-1543945835
https://www.wnyc.org/story/brooklyn-families-adjust-changes-middle-school-admissions/
