Shark-Fu blogs on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day:
Today, nooses are hung on high school campuses and arrogantly displayed on the cover of national magazines…media critics discuss how even racists will vote for an ‘acceptably black’ candidate and fashion editors chastise women of color for wearing natural hairstyles in corporate environments…the achievement of thousands is credited to the system they struggled against…the historic campaign of Shirley Chisholm is scarcely mentioned in an election year where a woman and a black man are trying to do separately what she strove to do as one in 1972…white supremacists plan to march in Jena Louisiana even as the language of immigration reform is laced with bigotry and fear…and education is still separate and unequal.
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Now is the time to honor the King legacy through action and unite in the struggle for what I know is possible…
…no longer a dream, more a reality yet to be achieved.
Hell, I voted for Shirley Chisolm in the Massachusetts primary in ’72. I heard her speak at Simmons College and thought she made more sense than either Nixon or McGovern. But my candidates always lose in the primary.
O.K. I can’t edit the above comment for some reason, so I’ll just add a new one.
and education is still separate and unequal.
To my mind this is the key to everything. Here in Illinois more than half of school funding is tied to property taxes. That means that an area with low property values has less ability to fund education in their school district. The state doesn’t make up sufficient funds from the general funds to make up the needed difference. So poor areas have inadequate schools. People with money won’t move into those areas, and developers don’t want to invest in them. And the kids grow up with inadequate educations and are behind the 8-ball from the start.
If kids a) have safe and properly funded schools to go to and b) get to school prepared to learn and go home to an environment where learning is supported, then they’ll have the tools to break out of poverty. While there’s certainly residual racism in the U.S., kids with a decent education will be able to get ahead no matter what their race is.
I’m not a proponent of government guaranteeing equal outcomes for everyone. But I am a proponent of government guaranteeing equal access to the resources necessary for people to have what they need for “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. Now, the people can have their government do something about a) above. But dealing with b) is more of a social issue that I don’t see a clear path for government to deal with effectively.
@RonF
While that’s true, I don’t think that would even begin to solve the mess that inner city schools have become. Even in places where they are very well funded (better than suburban ones) the situation is still a mess – you still get teachers who really would rather be teaching at a nice, harmless suburban school, you still have bureaucracies run by one-sided crony elections, and so on.
Not that I have a solution or disagree with you – I just don’t think equal funding will accomplish nearly as much as we’d hope it would.
“The nice part about being a pessimist is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised.”
— George Will
O.K. – let me amend “properly funded” to “properly run”. It’s in fact quite true that schools cannot be fixed simply by throwing money at them, and you are quite right to call me on it.
Based on what I see in my area (and talking to those of my daughter’s friends who got teaching degrees), teachers just starting out go to the poorer districts (which tend to be but are not limited to minority-majority districts) and immediately start applying to schools in wealthier districts. Even if the pay is the same, at the wealthier districts (I use that distinction because there are close-in suburban districts that are just as bad as some of the Chicago districts) the classes are smaller, the equipment is better, the school is safer and more of the kids show up prepared for the day. Once they are successful in doing so, that spot opens up for another new, inexperienced teacher.
Bad school boards and cronyism is a major fault in the schools. My elementary school district had some problems there. The problem came to a head (long story) and the electorate tossed out every incumbent on the school board. The new board then replaced the superintendent and the principal. But that requires an electorate that pays attention and goes to the polls. You don’t get that in the city as often.