You know, I sitting here thinking about this. And what if kids go to public schools and go to non-selective colleges or get a job or go to the military? Those kids deserve a good education as well, and other kids don't need to be protected from them.
@jbouie isn't framing it this way, but this strikes me as part of the problem. The marketization of public schools and education and viewing of children as commodities where our primary concerns are positioning them to compete for status and earn lots of money one day.
Yes, I want my child to learn math and reading and science, but not so she can go to Harvard one day and be a millionaire, but so that she can think and do and question. I want her to learn to have empathy. And that kids think in different ways. & that everyone has smthg to offer
I want her to derive her status not from her academic pedigree, but from how she contributes to this world and how she treats people, who like many in my family, never had an opportunity to go to a great school that taught all of these things.
Summing up schools, or worse, children, by their test scores is a very recent phenomenon. We know an education is about more than how well you test. Wealthy parents don’t choose schools for their own kids that teach nothing but rote for the test. Why is this ok for poor kids?
The social experiment is not integrated schools that look like our city. It is those who want to create faux islands of privilege and whiteness while claiming the banner of public education. The social experiment is creating a “public” without most of the public.
I’ve though about this a lot as I’m writing my book on school segregation. I’ve always tried to find the “perfect” black student who has done everything right to try to mitigate racism. I’m not doing that with this book. You shouldn’t have to be flawless to get a good education.
You shouldn’t have to be exceptional or able to succeed DESPITE facing every single obstacle. The kids with the least, who struggle the most, who are just mediocre, who can’t overcome, they need good schools the most. I’m not writing that “perfect victim” narrative anymore.
Somehow, privileged parents who do everything in their power to clear any and every obstacle for their own children expect children who face systemic, entrenched, multidimensional and generational obstacles to just buck up.
