[Mpls] Racism & Minneapolis Public Schools

[Laura Waterman Wittstock]

On Tuesday, July 6, 2004, at 07:53 PM, Socialist2001 at cs.com wrote:

> Last evening I was a guest on Voices of the African American community 
> on
> KMOJ, hosted by Spike Moss. And I have been invited back to 
> participate in an
> on-air discussion of educational issues within the next few weeks.
>
> I believe the Minneapolis school district can rapidly close most of the
> academic achievement gap between whites and African Americans by 
> making some
> changes in how education is done in the schools.


Black and white education gap issues may be relevant in Charleston or 
Memphis, but in Minneapolis the gap is economic and multi cultural. The 
painful process of gaining recognition for the issues of SE Asians, 
Latinos, American Indians, Africans, and immigrants from other 
countries will greatly challenge the next superintendent.

It is true that we are a long way from recognizing either the causes of 
the gap or the strategic direction to take to raise the achievement 
levels of all who are on the bottom line. It is not helpful, in my 
mind, to talk only of a gap, as if when the bottom line meets the top, 
we will be successful and happy. The top line does not define the best 
that we can do in our schools.

And it is short sighted to think that if we change the one factor: 
race, we will close the gap. Of all the factors affecting academic 
performance, race is the most difficult to isolate. Which is not to say 
that it does not exist. But of the factors we do know something about: 
economic disparity, neighborhood, health, housing, parents' educational 
background, place in sibling order, gender, resources of the schools, 
counseling availability, teacher quality, class size, amount of time 
spent on academic tasks, and on and on, give us plenty to work on in 
terms of improvement.

"Nickleby" (NCLB) is the most cynical model for addressing the gap. Get 
rid of it. Short changing schools is the biggest factor that can swing 
change on an ongoing basis.

The hardest thing to do, because it takes public will and courage on 
the part of the elected school board, is to "make some changes in how 
education is done in the schools," as the writer suggests above. We are 
instead confronted with a flavor of the month approach and various of 
the school sites experimenting with the most vulnerable school 
populations in an effort to meet the Nickleby demands.

Best wishes,

Laura Wittstock
Southeast


Laura Waterman Wittstock
MIGIZI Communications, Inc.
3123 East Lake Street
Minneapolis, MN 55406
612.721.6631 ext 219
wittstock at migizi.org
http://www.migizi.org
http://laurawatermanwittstock.blogspot.com/