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Jackie Mader / The Hechinger Report
Students attend a summer session at Lyon Elementary School near the city of Clarksdale in the Mississippi Delta. School districts throughout the state could see increased competition from charter schools if a controversial bill passes the Mississippi Legislature this session.
Mississippi lawmaker Kenneth Wayne Jones, a Democrat, briefly became a political pariah last winter when he voted in favor of a proposal to expand charter schools in his state. He was the only African-American state senator to support the bill, which most members of Mississippi’s legislative Black Caucus disavowed. Jones liked the idea of expanded school options for families, but he also understood his colleagues’ mistrust.
“You’ve got conservative Republicans all of a sudden showing a lot of concern about the education of African-American children, while in the same breath they are denying them health care,” Jones said.
This winter, charter supporters will make their fifth attempt in five years to bring charters to Mississippi, one of a dwindling number of states without a real charter school law. (The state has an existing law so restrictive that no charters have opened.)
But the deep-rooted skepticism of the state’s black leadership remains one of the biggest obstacles to bipartisan support for charters in Mississippi and throughout the South, where powerful white Democrats are a disappearing breed. It also speaks to broader mistrust among black officials nationwide — particularly those who came of age before or during the civil rights movement — toward contemporary school reform efforts they believe are being imposed by outsiders on low-income, minority communities.
“White people cannot tell us what’s best for educating our children,” said state Sen. David Jordan, a 78-year-old African American from the Mississippi Delta town of Greenwood. “Heck, we did it for decades without even the money for books. Through the help of God we made it.”
Similar tensions have emerged in Washington, D.C. and New Orleans, where veteran black politicians and venerable civil rights organizations like the NAACP have been among the most vociferous opponents of recent education reforms. Those changes include the expansion of charter schools, the recruitment of out-of-town educators through programs like Teach For America, and the weakening of job protections for teachers.
In Mississippi, which has the nation’s highest rate of childhood poverty and posts some of the weakest test scores, there’s particular urgency to improving the schools. Advocates of charters believe the autonomous schools will help boost the state’s abysmal academic performance. They say they can learn from mistakes made in other states to ensure Mississippi’s charter law is exemplary.
Critics counter that the state needs to focus on fully funding the schools it already operates and create a desperately needed pre-kindergarten program before it looks to alternatives like charters. They also worry that the charter movement will be hijacked by virtual schools and for-profit companies hoping to profit off of Mississippi’s children.
The support of the Black Caucus likely won’t be crucial to passing a new charter school law in Mississippi, though. Republicans control both houses of the legislature, some Democrats support charters, and Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant, who is white, has made the issue one of his top priorities. (Last year’s bill failed largely because a few key Republicans didn’t support it.)
But the caucus’ response will be a litmus test for whether black leaders are growing more receptive—or more resistant—to the reforms that are steadily reshaping public education across America.
Charter skeptics
The debate over school reform doesn’t always fall neatly along racial lines. President Barack Obama has embraced charters and other controversial changes. Black leaders like Howard Fuller in Milwaukee and Geoffrey Canada in New York City are among the most outspoken and prominent supporters of radical changes to the traditional public school structure. And, as the divide between Jones and Jordan illustrates, not all members of Mississippi’s Black Caucus are united in full-throated opposition to charters.
But in Mississippi and elsewhere, charter and reform backers have often struggled to win over civil rights organizations like the NAACP and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, as well as a majority of black lawmakers and voters.
In Washington D.C., for instance, former mayor Adrian Fenty lost his re-election bid in 2010 at least partly because middle-class black voters were frustrated with the hard-charging style of his schools chief, Michelle Rhee. She not only supported charters but also aggressively pushed to close low-performing schools and fire struggling teachers. In New Orleans, thousands of educators lost their jobs in the lead up to the rapid chartering of the city’s schools after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The move left many of the city’s predominantly black veteran educators feeling disenfranchised and suspicious of the changes. And in New York City, NAACP leader Hazel Dukes underscored her organization’s intense disdain for charters when she accused a parent who supported them of “doing the business of slave masters.”
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The racial tensions surrounding school reform have complicated origins. Mississippi State Sen. Jordan, a retired public-school science teacher, said he fears charters partly because they could bring more white out-of-state educators to Mississippi who won’t be able to relate to the children there. “Teachers who come in claim they can do a yeoman’s job,” he said. “But I don’t think someone can come from Illinois and do a better job with the kids of the Mississippi Delta than the teachers who are already here.”
Jordan also worries that charters could mean a loss of black power and leadership in rural communities where the black community fought long and hard to claim top positions in the schools. In the Delta town of Indianola, for example, the black community staged a lengthy boycott of white businesses in order to get the first African-American school superintendent appointed in 1986.
“If you go to another model, people are not going to hire African Americans in the top positions,” said Jordan. “The bottom line is to eliminate African Americans.”
In the Mississippi Delta, nearly 90 percent of the public-school children are black, and school districts are one of the few sources of stable jobs.
“In rural counties, the school districts are the main employer,” said Mike Sayer, senior organizer at Southern Echo, a black leadership organization based in Jackson that opposes charters. “If these school districts go down altogether, it will have a crippling effect. In a lot of these communities there are no other places to work.”
Lessons from New Orleans
Charter proponents say they hope talented local educators will open charters, and that fears of widespread upheaval and displacement are overblown.
“Forty other states have [charters] and, to my knowledge, traditional public education hasn’t been destroyed,” said Sanford Johnson, deputy director of Mississippi First, a nonprofit education advocacy organization that supports charters.
Mississippi First executive director Rachel Canter adds that charter supporters have been careful to specify in the proposed bill that all educators with strong track records will be eligible to open charters — regardless of whether their experience is with charter or traditional schools. That way, Mississippi locals will not feel dissuaded from the start.
In search of high-quality teachers, charter school network trains its own
“Whether local people can open charters has been a huge issue for the Black Caucus,” Canter said.
A draft of the bill presented earlier this winter calls for a statewide authorizing board to vet charter applicants. In low-performing school districts, applicants would need only the board’s approval to open. But in stronger districts, they would also need a nod from a majority of local school-board members.
“The most important thing is to give new opportunities to talented educators who are right there in their communities,” said Kenneth Campbell, president of the Black Alliance for Educational Options, which advocates for charters and increased school choice for low-income black families.
Campbell points out that in New Orleans — ground zero for controversy surrounding education reform — several of the most successful charters were started by black veteran educators who ran traditional public schools before Katrina. The city has a higher percentage of charters than any other, and could become the first citywide school system comprised entirely of charters within the next few years.
New Orleans has also attracted national charter-school networks such as the Knowledge is Power Program and Future Is Now Schools, and most of the school leaders recruited by the charter “incubator” New Schools for New Orleans have come from out of town. The new, less local leadership has helped contribute to the changing demographics of the city’s teacher corps.
Before Katrina, New Orleans had one of the highest percentages of black educators of any city in the country. But starting in 2007 that percentage began to drop steadily, to 63 percent during the 2007-08 school year, and 57 percent the next year, according to data from the Louisiana Department of Education.
Overall, test scores are going up for a variety of reasons, and parents of all races and income levels have reported growing satisfaction with the city’s public schools. But “one can be as kumbaya as they come and still worry about the psychological effect on black children who come to equate both education and authority with whiteness,” wrote Times-Picayune columnist Jarvis DeBerry of the shift.
Trying to overcome history, mistrust
History might be one of the biggest obstacles to building more broad-based support for charter schools in Mississippi.
Black officials say it’s tough to trust that the state’s white leadership has the best interests of children at heart when they have underfunded the public schools for so long.
Many also fear that charters could provide a means for dozens of nearly all-white “segregation academies” to obtain public funding. The draft legislation doesn’t allow private schools to convert to charters, but that provision has not squelched the fears. Many of the academies are facing declining enrollments as middle-class whites flee the Delta, and would jump at the chance to become charters, skeptics say.
New US visa rush: Build charter school, get green card
“Claiming that private schools can’t convert to charter schools is nonsense,” said Sayer, who adds that savvy school operators will be able to find a way around the letter of the law. But Mississippi First’s Johnson says the statewide authorizing board would be able to identify suspect applicants because of the rigorous approval process outlined in the proposed bill.
“Mississippi’s history is the reason people are suspicious about all these things,” said Nancy Loome, executive director of The Parents’ Campaign, which supports a more restricted charter law that would ban virtual and for-profit operators.
Campbell acknowledges that “people have long memories” in Mississippi, which can make it challenging to build trust. But he said lawmakers and citizens of all races and political affiliations are more open to the concept of charters than in previous years.
“There’s an increased desire to learn more,” he said.
Kenneth Wayne Jones, who will chair the Black Caucus during the upcoming legislative session, agrees.
“I don’t think it will be as toxic as it was last year,” he said. “I don’t know if the Caucus will be more supportive when it comes to votes, but I know we’ll be listening more than last year. If this train is coming, we need to make sure we are on it.”
This story was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, nonpartisan education-news outlet based at Teachers College, Columbia University. Sarah Carr, a contributing editor at The Hechinger Report, is the author of the forthcoming "Hope Against Hope: Three Schools, One City, and the Struggle to Educate America’s Children" (Bloomsbury Press, February 2013).
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Leave a Comment:
I see a lot about the black caucus. But, what about the white caucus?
Oops. That would be racist, wouldn't it Jesse and Al?
The white caucus has existed for over 200 years in this country. It has traditionally been called the House and Senate.
Or not. Your white = default argument is so overplayed.
So the house and senate, in fact the majority of government and business in this country haven't been traditionally, and still to this day, controlled by white men?
Did I miss something?
You got the "white" part right. You just left out the "caucus" part. In political terms, a caucus is a subset of a legislative body that holds closed meetings to select candidates or set policy for their group. White men certainly meet each other to do this, but there is no Congressional White Caucus.
Denver,
That was my point. Because they've held the lion's share of the power, they've always had the opportunity to "caucus", whether officially or not. Anyone who denies that is just silly.
Because the teachers that are already there are doing such a wonderful job. Isn't MS one of the least-educated states in the country?
The unspoken assumption that only Blacks can teach Blacks is the main problem I see here. Aren't we all one species with the same brain? Get the best people to teach your kids, not just ones of the same color.
This argument here has nothing to do with educating black children. It's about jobs for black adults. They don't give a rat's ass about educating the children.
I don't like the Congress much, then again I didn't vote for anyone currently seated in either the House or the Senate, but somebody did. In fact (unless you believe the elections are rigged) a majority of people put whomever is in the Congress there.
For those of you who have been living under a rock or have spent the last forty years on another planet, old white men (nor young white men) are no longer the voting majority and haven't been for some time now.
I know that's going to crush some of those racial theorists out there, but that's the facts.
Whatever it is, it is because you wanted that way.
Senator David Jordan - "White people cannot tell us what's best for educating our children" - just imagine if a white senator had said that about black people?
And the guy comes from Mississippi - who's state motto is practically - Poverty and Lack of Education in mass.
Yep. Guess who is the bigot in that senate?
The state of education in the black community proves that statement true.
Hi, DB.
"he fears charters partly because they could bring more white out-of-state educators to Mississippi who won’t be able to relate to the children there."
"Jordan also worries that charters could mean a loss of black power and leadership in rural communities where the black community fought long and hard to claim top positions in the schools."
"But “one can be as kumbaya as they come and still worry about the psychological effect on black children who come to equate both education and authority with whiteness,” wrote Times-Picayune columnist Jarvis DeBerry of the shift.
"Those changes include the expansion of charter schools, the recruitment of out-of-town educators through programs like Teach For America, and the weakening of job protections for teachers."
Yep. It is always about what is best for the children, isn't it?
Thinking the same thing. What it boils down to is not education for the children, but jobs for the blacks. And since teaching is one of the few jobs available for blacks in Mississippi, those jobs in the public education sector have to be preserved, even if it is abundantly clear that it has heretofore not been in the best interest of the children of Mississippi, especially the black children, who make up 90% of the students in the public schools.
Did I get that right? In spite of the harsh reality of what I just posted, did I boil it down to the facts?
And do keep in mind that a black man is trying to change this equation in order to help the black children, at the expense of his political career. And make no bones about it, it WILL cost him.
I'd be suspicious of republicans too on the issue of education...they all seem hell bent in being the state with the least spending per pupil, the highest teen pregnancy rates, the highest infant mortailty, the lowest paid jobs and the most ignorant...they all go hand in hand
I still think some of the charter schools are giving kickbacks to politicians. This has nothing to do with education.
Take my state PA for example - the appointed sec of education for the state is a staunch supporter of charter schools and has several buddies who run them. @!$%#ing hogwash if you ask me.
When is Mississippi gonna come out of the dark ages and start doing something about issues without it always having to be racial? They need education for all kids, health care for all, teachers of all colors, etc. Everything that happens in this state seems to be political or racial - nothing about just fixing problems.
Polly, in Mississippi it really is all about race. I've been in and throuh Mississippi, a beautiful state with very beautiful houses, all high on the hill, painted white, Georgian in style (that's George 3 of England), and the jobs done as far as upkeep and cooking are basically done by blacks for whites. Of course it's pretty much the same in Alabama and Georgia.
I love to visit Mississippi, it's a very nice state with tremendous people, as individuals. As are most states, or at least all the states, and that's most, that I've visited.
What I can't understand is how such a poor standard of education for kindergarten through high school can produce such good colleges and universities. It's because the people of Mississippi can't stand the thought of putting money, which is really what it takes, into grade school education while giving it for higher education. I would think Mississippians would want to be a shining light in education at the lower level. If for no other reason than to let the rest of the US kiss its' butt.
But when the town is 80 percent black, then whites shouldn't be the ruling class. That's where race comes in. I live in a county in my state that's 60 percent black (I'm an American Indian) and the ratio of educators, civic leaders, county leaders and so forth is about the same. And we consistently score among the highest in the state in education and services.
Let's face it, Polly, if you were black in Mississippi, would you trust the same whites that gave you Ross Barnett and his ilk?
@rickintheforest, I don't trust Republians on education, nor on much of anything else either.
Its not that they cant stand to see their money go to K-12, its that they have no money. Poverty runs rampant through the entire state yet the people their keep putting idiot conservatives in office.
You want change MIss? Stop putting dip@!$%# republicans in office.
“White people cannot tell us what’s best for educating our children,” said state Sen. David Jordan, a 78-year-old African American from the Mississippi Delta town of Greenwood. “Heck, we did it for decades without even the money for books. Through the help of God we made it.”
Way to go on keeping segregation alive & well.
"In Mississippi, which has the nation’s highest rate of childhood poverty and posts some of the weakest test scores, there’s particular urgency to improving the schools."
“Teachers who come in claim they can do a yeoman’s job,” he said. “But I don’t think someone can come from Illinois and do a better job with the kids of the Mississippi Delta than the teachers who are already here.”
Maybe they can.
If you think its only black people who are keeping segregation alive you are clueless. White are still every bit as racist as they were at the beginning of this century.
I did not say "it's only black people". However, this particular article is not about white racists trying to keep black educators out of their schools.
"The racial tensions surrounding school reform have complicated origins. Mississippi State Sen. Jordan, a retired public-school science teacher, said he fears charters partly because they could bring more white out-of-state educators to Mississippi who won’t be able to relate to the children there."
Apparently, his fellow black educators are having a difficult time relating to these children too.
"We did it before with the help of God"? Really? Okay. No advice from whitey. Only black people can run the educational system in Mississippi. May I refer you to Detroit, MI? See how well it worked out for them? Instead of making this into yet another racial issues, why not address the real reasons why black kids are failing scholastically? There are CULTURAL issues that need immediate addressing. Education needs to be valued for a child to want to succeed. You need to address the parents for their failure to supervise or even care about their child's education. Maybe we need boarding charter schools. Remove the child from their toxic homes, and maybe they'll have a chance to succeed and break the cycle of poverty once and for all.
Are you F'ing kidding me! A white person can't educate a black kid as well as a black? Then there shouldn't be black teachers teaching white kids! Let's see who does better on tests! LOL
I'm guessing it would be those students who's educations have the best funding, and not dependent on race, per se.
Well history would say you're wrong, we've pumped tens of millions into failing schools in inner cities and didn't raise test scores one bit.
It's not money, it's parenting and a cultural thing.
Really? You think increasing funding has raised inner-city schools to the fiscal levels of suburbia and/or private schools and that funding has no role in success? By the way, take a look at "No Child Left Behind" it doesn't quite work the way you think it does.
http://sitemaker.umich.edu/mitchellyellin.356/poverty&config=9f9fSNJ3WQTHA67s6qkN8w
http://www.brianscollier.com/classreadings/ReadingsESS43640/Anyon%201995%20Race,%20class%20and%20educational%20reform.pdf
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/20798336?uid=3739600&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21101635955927
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-298.html
http://www.education.com/reference/article/Ref_What_Makes_School/
http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=702
Your source for it being cultural and parental, and your source for all that supposed funding??? You really think that inner city homes/parents are the only one's that are screwed up?
I'm going to pick up on the statement... but I'm going to focus on what the black political guy said, that a white person can't educate a black child as well as a black person can.
And, if that's the case, then it follows that a black person can't educate a white child as well as a white person can.
Couldn't possibly have anything to do with the quality of the curriculum or the ability of the teacher or the makeup of the classes or the parenting the kids received before they sat their rear ends down in the classroom seats.
Nope, just the color of the teachers versus the students. Now we know.
Obviously, both of those statements are absolutely FALSE. If anything, we need MORE diversity, in order to solve these cultural problems, and better, SMARTER funding to solve most of the educational ones.
Sarah,
Agree with you. Just pointing out how utterly stupid the black politician was in saying such a thing, and how mired in racial bigotry the blacks of his district are in reelecting him when he holds such views in the first place.
Racism and bigotry are not the purview of whites exclusively, in the South. There are whites and blacks who have transcended the color line and we have a hard time dragging our beloved ancestors along with us at times.
It's these hard core politicians who have a death grip on the voting blocks and policy makers that make it so hard on the rest of us.
But we can pay for it right?
African Americans have no integrity whatsoever...nada...either drop the American, hop on some transportation back to Africa and get on with your life...or drop the African and the racism dodge, compete with all other Americans and get on with your life...African American are racist while always pleading the case of how dumb they are because they're under privileged...what a scam...
I'm an Italian American. Does this mean I have to go back to Italy? Oh well, the food will be better, I guess.
Yeah...same logic applies...learn to cook better...drop the Italian crap...if everybody in America prepended American with their heritage we'd have a German Italian Greek Spanish Cherokee American...
Well that would be true, if you know, we weren't a nation of immigrants, built by immigrants. You are aware that our "culture" is nothing but a meshing of numerous foreign cultures, right? You've never ate at a Chinese restaurant? Never went to Olive Garden?
Your position is ridiculous and xenophobic, and that's being generous.
I'm a EuroCanAmerican...I don't know where to go. lol
They still practice slavery, or "forced labor" in many parts of Africa as well as other parts of the world. Here we give our impoverished government assistance, there well, they do put them directly to work. Be careful what you wish for.
Were you born in Italy?
No? Then you're not Italian-American. You're just American, and I think that's the position that Dee Ten was trying to assume.
These labels are very divisive.
Only if you're exclusive and unwilling to accept people from other cultures. It would be impossible to live in this country, without rubbing up against a foreign influence.
Sarah -
"Only if you're exclusive and unwilling to accept people from other cultures."
People that prepend their culture to American are trying to be exclusive and in many cases trying to garner an unfair advantage over other Americans...there are many Americans with Italian ancestry that classify themselves as Americans...there are many Americans with African ancestry that classify themselves as Americans...the prependers are the pretenders and offenders of the American culture...don't want to be an American then go to your prepend land...
Sarah-3043284: I've been reading over all of your comments and have reached the conclusion that you don't have a clue as to what you are talking about. Let's take school funding for example. The highest paid teachers in nation are in Chicago and Chicago spends almost double per pupil what downstate Illinois schools spend. Yet, the graduation rate is only 65% and the average ACT score is 17 (keep in mind the really dumb ones have dropped out before taking the ACT). School funding, classroom size, early childhood programs, etc. have no impact on student performance. It's the parents, plain and simple. The only difference between a high performing school and a low performing school is the high performing school have parents that care and are involved. The rest of it is just a bunch a crap so the inner city teacher's unions can grab more money, a lot of which goes to the Democratic Party under the "you scratch my back I'll scratch your's" plan.
You want to know why whites are fleeing school systems with large black student populations? Because we want our kids to get a good education. That's not racist, that's protection of self-interest. Systems with large black student populations are easy targets for black caucuses and teacher unions and they collectively suck the blood out of the system. They get away with it because the black parents don't care. The whites basically are willing to pay twice, once to get their kids a good education and once to give blacks their own school systems and let them do what they please with it. Think I'm wrong, go back and read that article again and pick up the words "jobs for blacks" and "black superintendent."
You must have missed the part where I said not just better, but SMARTER funding.
Your sources? Any proof, besides your say so, that none of those programs work? Because I can find proof of the opposite...
http://www.childrenslearninginstitute.org/library/publications/documents/Effective-Early_Childhood-Programs.pdf
http://scholar.google.com/scholar_url?hl=en&q=http://qje.oxfordjournals.org/content/115/4/1239.full.pdf&sa=X&scisig=AAGBfm28sEwfbiAfHof3kGsbkad32JBAuA&oi=scholarr
http://bul.sagepub.com/content/88/640/29.short
Again, source? And then how do you explain the successful kids from screwed up families? Unless you think that screwed up families don't occur in white homes???
Trust me, I'm no fan of the teacher's union either. I'm just less of a fan of misinformed people who post unsubstantiated claims as "the truth".
Dee,
Again, you're just straight up paranoid and xenophobic. America and American, aren't determined by you, nor does recognizing an ancestry take away from someone's love for this country. In fact, YOU partake of those different ancestries every day. You want to know what does, however??? Biases, fear and bigotry. I suggest you get over it. No one's going anywhere, and they are more than free to refer to themselves as whatever they want.
That's called freedom. You know, that AMERICAN ideal???
Just keep telling yourself that, tap your heels together three times, and maybe you will end up in Kansas some day. By the way, why is it you have so much time to comment on this article. Don't you have a job or something else to do?
William,
Still no sources to prove anything you said?
Sarah, are you bags packed to go back home? I'm sure you are correct that the food in Italy is better than the Olive Garden (puke, not real italian food)
Couldn't have said it better myself. Nothing is worse than bad Italian. I wonder if I should pack the Louie Vuitton? Just another example of foreign culture in our country.
Really Sarah? If I spend the time providing the sources do you think I can change your mind? You have already told me whatever proof I can offer you can refute with a different source. I bet if I provided you my vitae you wouldn't acknowledge my expertise in this area (do you know what a vitae is?).
Bottom line is the black family unit is a disaster and the black leaders really don't care. 78% of all black children are born out-of-wedlock and there isn't a damn thing I can do about it. 33% of all black men beteween 18-34 have a felony conviction and that number is expected to go to 50% by 2020.
The black leaders just want more programs with more funding to line their pockets. Liberals like you support that and I'm ok with that. I'll pay the extra taxes, just tell me how far out I have to move to keep my family away from that disaster.
"Doctor" Sarah (since you can diagnose the xenophobic an paranoid, I assume you are a licensed Shrink) -
I gotta admire your hubris and hypocricy! You lambaste others for being "misinformed people who post unsubstantiated claims as "the truth".
You post lot's of web links, and we all know that nothing on the web is ever wrong or slanted, right?
Got a source to prove: "If anything, we need MORE diversity, in order to solve these cultural problems, and better, SMARTER funding to solve most of the educational ones?"
I won't wait . . .
FYI: You might want to read:
Black-White Test Scores: Neighborhoods, Not Schools, Matter Most (National Bureau of Economic Research)
Maybe parent involvement and support of students matter more than funding and diversity?
Did anyone pick up the part of this story that stated ,when the percentage of Black teachers in New Orleans went down ,their SAT scores went way up. I myself went to school in New Orleans in the seventies. I had a couple of good black teachers ,one of them was a very good teacher and my favorite teacher to this day, another one was the biggest raciest and I hated him. I also had some black teachers that spoke so badly I couldn't even understand what they said. I don't want to sound like I'm putting down black teachers, because I'm not, but I do believe ,especially during the seventies, many black teachers were given the job just because they were black, and because of that everyone suffered ,black and white students alike.
MPA,
Well the problem there is that I never said parents DON'T matter. It's Mr. Watson that's taking the all or nothing approach. To disregard the link between funding and educational success is willfully ignorant, at best.
And if you think my sources are skewed than PROVE IT. And you do realize that the majority of "black" schools are ALSO those with the least funding??? I.E. inner city schools.
William,
Of course you won't provide sources. Regardless of what I think of them. You won't provide them, because you don't have them. You posted your bias assertions as "truth", when what they are, are baseless, prejudice opinions.
There is NO "gene" inherent in black people to account for any of the claims either of you have made.
http://www.childrenslearninginstitute.org/library/publications/documents/Effective-Early_Childhood-Programs.pdf
http://scholar.google.com/scholar_url?hl=en&q=http://qje.oxfordjournals.org/content/115/4/1239.full.pdf&sa=X&scisig=AAGBfm28sEwfbiAfHof3kGsbkad32JBAuA&oi=scholarr
http://bul.sagepub.com/content/88/640/29.short
http://sitemaker.umich.edu/mitchellyellin.356/poverty&config=9f9fSNJ3WQTHA67s6qkN8w
http://www.brianscollier.com/classreadings/ReadingsESS43640/Anyon%201995%20Race,%20class%20and%20educational%20reform.pdf
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/20798336?uid=3739600&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21101635955927
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-298.html
http://www.education.com/reference/article/Ref_What_Makes_School/
http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=702
There's nothing worse than sanctimonious people getting their panties in a wad when asked to actually PROVE their points.
Sarah -
you might Google (or whatever): "black-white divide on test scores". If you actually read the various studies, they overwhelmingly admit that there is little to no correlation between funding and performance. (You have to do some work as most of the reports are at state level.)
Dumbest thing I have read this year.
Trying only paying teachers $20K a year nation wide and watch what happens to our education system. While throwing truck loads of money at it may have diminishing returns - dropping the funding would not be beneficial either.
MPA,
Yes, and that's fine because CORRELATION doesn't equal CAUSALITY. So saying there is no correlation, doesn't mean that isn't the cause.
Try taking a quantitative research course.
And you still haven't proved a single one of those sources wrong, so are you just willfully ignoring them. My guess is, yes, yes you are, in order to maintain your prejudice.
Correlation is a valid tool when comparing the value of a given effort. Direct correlation is difficult because there are often many variables. Comparing dollars spent and efficacy in education is very difficult as there are so many variables. Trending is less precise but a better tool. In a rough calculation; take the numbers of students in a given age range, correlate it to grade level. Then examine the amount of money spent in the education system proportioned to those ages and grade range. Go back and review measures of success (pick a couple - graduation rates, college entrance, standardized exams, drop out rates, etc.). Lay the data over each other and look at what happens. The trend in the United States has remained fairly constant over the past thirty years. The dollar amount per student and the gross dollars spent on education have been on a steady and gradual rise. The negative data have either remained constant or have risen, the positive data have either remained constant or have decreased.
The ranking of American students against students from other industrialized countries routinely places them near the bottom (average is 25th). It's been that way for nearly thirty years, regardless of how much money we spend. It gets discouraging when you then compare the rates of education spending among the 24 leading industrial countries that lead the US in student scores. It's very telling....your children are stupid, inspite of all those "My child is an Honor Student at........" bumper sticker.
I propose we raise money for the school system by selling bumper stickers that say "My child ranked Last Place among students from 25 industrialized nations".
How about, "I'm a moderately proud parent of an average student"???
Aren't right wingers just the wrost people on Earth? Seriously. They do little but hold people down to benefit themselves. Then they roll out a flag and call it capitalism and the American way.
Well, like your pappy Obama, you can always find someone to blame for your failures...just ignore the GOP and get on with whatever you are so concerned about doing that you thing the GOP is keeping you from doing...rationalization only makes you weaker...
Ask your POTUS how he afforded an education at Harvard....
"Ask your POTUS how he afforded an education at Harvard...."
The diploma from Harvard we bought for Obama but it is evident that Obama isn't well educated...
Right - because a majority in the house doesnt allow them to completely rail road government (one need look no further than the fiscal cliff negotiations). Stop obstructing government and we will get on with it. And when 2014 rolls around - expect to be voted out. You people are old product - no one listens to your garbage - no one cares about your political philosophy.
Where's your degree from?
And those bastards can spell too! God, don't you hate them? Who said there's no irony, a post about education where the person posting not only can't spell, but can not use the spell checker. Actually, I'm sure it was just a simple oversight, but it's still ironic.
The article seems to make a case for keeping racism alive and well in Mississippi. Is there never going to be a time when we look at each other as Americans, rather than black or white? Maybe that isn't really possible in some areas. There seems to be some jealously guarded effort to keep the underdog mentality alive while rejecting efforts to provide the opportunity to rise above poverty.
Clearly, the folks quoted in the article are totally afraid of change, even though the performance of their educational system is poor.
Whatever is happening in Mississippi the education program has not been working. A child from a private school is more prepared for college or to advance compared to the public education. If charter schools might help then they should be allowed to try.
How will the government keep blacks on the government plantation if they are exposed to a real education?
An education is something a person achieves regardless of the quality of the teachers...the educational system's position that they are educating people is about as accurate as the prison system's position that they are punishing people so that when the prisoner leaves prison they'll be a model citizens...the educational system is just a puppy mill...
If the people of Mississippi want charter schools, I say let them have them. But I can tell you that my daughter, who is an elementary school teacher, tried teaching in two urban Ohio charter schools populated almost entirely by minorities, and she found those schools terribly inferior to the Tennessee public school where she formerly worked (mostly with minority children). The charters seem to do a good job of marketing (often for profit) to poorly informed parents, but the product the charters deliver is sometimes horribly inadequate. Also, the charters sometimes pay teachers less (and provide inferior benefits), so they often are not able to attract the most experienced, dedicated teachers. The most important contribution parents can make in educating their children is to socialize them early and stay involved in helping them learn. Charter schools, in many cases, do not solve anything, and may irreparably harm the chances of these children succeeding. There absolutely is no substitute for good parenting.
Charter or public doesn't matter when the teaching is to the slowest members of the class. Quit catering and set the bar high. Don't make it? Stay in that grade for another year. Guess I'm showing my age and how we were educated.
Yep. And still trying to commit reason, eh, cunical?
Liberals, both black and white, want to keep black kids uneducated, poor and dependant upon them for everything. Otherwise, they will lose their votes and power.
Just like the flawed logic behind affirmative action. Blacks are too stupid to do it on their own and need help to succeed.
This kind of prejudice is what's holding generation after generation of blacks back.
And where is the self responsibility of the black community, or just the individual blacks themselves? WE, as a nation and as citizens, don't owe anyone, of any race, creed, color, persuasion, religion, nationality, sex or any other 'protected class' ANYTHING.
The motto of our nation, use to be; "You want it, YOU work to pay for it"...It's sicking that it's not a requirement for breeding any longer.
Actually thats what republicans who do that. One need look no further than the red state this article pertains to. Haley Barbour would be proud of your nonsensical yammering.
That is why your ilk does not matter anymore.
Chicago public school districts provide twice the funding for their students, yet these students have lower-than-average SAT test scores. One common thread with low test scores is not school funding, nor is it parental involvement; the common thread to low SAT test performance is race and race alone. And blacks aren't just poor performers on SAT scores; they also collectively average 85 on the Stanford-Binet IQ test.
Therefore, it is not possible for the black student to improve his academic standing without first lowering the academic standards imposed on him. Charter schools do exactly this. The charter school has less rigor than a public school, enabling the black student to graduate with a diploma that he otherwise would not be able to obtain--an inability due to the black student's deficit of intellect.
Throwing more $ at the black student will not help him graduate. Passing legislation that would have his parents take an active, albeit compulsory, role in his education will not help him graduate. The only thing that will help the black student graduate is to lower the bar. Charter schools (learn4life, etc.) do exactly this.
Georgia consistently scores near the bottom on SAT, yet all children are encouraged, nearly pushed, into taking it. Iowa, consistently near or at the top, discourages children that aren't high learners to take that test. Tell me which is right.
I say make all school children take the SAT and the ACT. Then compare scores. Then show me how many children in poverty, single parent or similarly disadvantaged situations, and compare those scores with those that don't have the disadvantages.
However, education is there if a child wants it, or doesn't have to quit school as quite a few do to help feed the family, is living alone, with abusive parents, siblings or whoever or whatever.
There just isn't any such thing as can't we all just get along, nor is there any kumbayah. It's pretty much dog eat dog. It was when I was growing up also, just not as bad.
All students are required by law to take the ACT in Illinois, so our numbers are reliable.
SAT scores are not an indicator of education. In high school I was a C student and scored the same score on my SAT's as my straight A cousin.
I'm from Long Beach, CA. We had charter schools that had 100% black males enrolled in them. Basically, for the same lame arguments being made here. They don't exist anymore. Why, because when the state went in to test the students, they found that the students could not pass them, the 'teachers' were not teaching state mandated curriculum and the kids were so under-educated, they couldn't pass grade level reading, writing or spelling exams, much less pass the mandated Star testing.
The funding was pulled and those 'type' of schools are gone. We still have Charter schools, but they are basically, part of the regular schools system that has parents required to participate 60 a year, and they decide where the money, for the individual school, gets focused on.
Angela I feel your pain.
One thing worrisome about Obama's Race to the Top" program (despite the use of the term "Race" in "Race to the Top) is its heavy emphasis on the charter school--a school that serves the black student, and a school that's divorced from the rigors and testing criteria imposed on public schools.
I believe Obama's aggressive push of the charter school is to give free 'hand-out' diplomas to black students; he must do this, because firstly, he knows that the black student is an academic underachiever at-birth, and secondly, he's black himself, so he must provide an act of servitude for his people. I do not believe Obama cares about turning out high-grade high-school graduates; his first priority is one of 'diversity' and not one of 'high-grade high-school graduates'. For this reason, our nation will see an increase of dull high-school graduates, and a decrease of quality ones in proportion.
This is so, as the Race to the Top program has made it so. Pushing black underachievers through our high-school commencement ceremonies has been a top priority of Obama's, as it is a top priority of the Race to the Top program.
BTW, how is the weather in Long Beach? CSU Long Beach is on my short list of universities I plan on matriculating into.
It's cold for California, in the 60's. Cooler at night, 30's and 40's, we've had some rain this year. CSU Long Beach is a pretty good school, but it's really crowded right now and the students are having a hard time getting classes, but I've heard that's typical throughout colleges nation wide. If you plan to live here, and aren't from the area, stay FAR AWAY from downtown (it's a ghetto and I'm being kind) or Belmont Shore (it looks nice, but crimes like rape and home invasions are a regular occurrence in that area.) Stick to the traffic circle apartments on the shopping center side by the condo's and you'll be okay.
Our Charter schools are part of the school system, which has over-site. As LB is the fifth largest city (at least it was last I checked), the school district wasn't about to part with money and letting it go to waste. And, we have no Charter School high schools. When those kids, who learned nothing, ended up in the local high schools, they would be responsible for their (the kids) failure to be educated in the end. Guess who'd be sued? We have now 'small learning communities' in our high schools. Certain kids, mostly by grade point average (or 'Art" kids), are grouped together, you don't get to move out of your SLC either, once in, you're in. It's easier to see who the kids are that failed to obtain any education at all and probably wont graduate...because here, you have service hours you must do, you must pass certain classes (there is no summer school. You fail, you repeat the grade), you must past the high school test (and for the life of me I can't think of it's name at the moment). Giving away degrees is never going to happen here, and I hope it never does.
Charter Schools can be a great alternative, but only if they have good over-site and that's not what these people are looking for.
This is just ridiculous!!! Of course this is more about politics & race then education. I'm from the south, well to be more specific I'm from Mississippi & yes I'm also white. My sister & her family live in the Delta. My niece attends a public school there that is 90% black 10% white ratio. Her principal is black as well as most of if not all of her teachers are black. This school is not even rating a level, which means the school basically sucks!! So what difference does it REALLY make if a teacher is black or white teaching a black or white student? It doesn't! Most of the schools around Mississippi suck mainly due to the fact that sometimes the teachers SUCK at teaching (or they are just plain scared for fear of getting shot or beat down), the students don't care if they learn & the parents could care less about their kids education! I myself have 16 year old in the public school system in central Mississippi. His school is evenly divided in race with students & the majority of the teachers are white. The black kids in my kids school do exceptionally well. Some I know personally because they are either my kids friends or I am friends with their mothers. So teaching a kid has nothing to with color but everything to do with the teacher, the kid, & the parents making sure their kid gets properly educated (minus the race card).
You state the obvious very nicely. Too bad it needs stating, isn't it?
no comment
The story is about the education system in Mississippi, really who cares? The people of Mississippi obviously don't care and that is somehow suppose to drive me into a frenzy about the standards in Mississippi? If anyone is suppose to care about Mississippi's education system it should be the people of Mississippi, not some moron in Colorado. If anyone is going to pay to fix the education system in Mississippi it should be the good folks of Mississippi and not the good folks of Colorado.
Or is the implication here that Mississippi can't fix it's own education system? Is a system where the majority of educators and administrators are black incapable of producing educated students? Is there some nefarious coalition of evil people holding the students of Mississippi back from achieving academic success? Are you suggesting that the federal government needs to step in and take over the school system in Mississippi or maybe the federal government has to provide additional and supplemental funds to the Mississippi school system?
No matter how you slice it, Mississippi winds up looking bad. But regardless, it's Mississippi's responsibility to fix it or surrender control over to the federal government (which technically has no constitutional authority to take over unless it where deemed a civil rights issue).
Postscript...I have had the privilege and honor of knowing many admirable folks from the great State of Mississippi and have gained much from knowing them...I am saddened to hear that they have fallen so low.
I clicked on this article because I was shocked by the title and I asked myself how a charter school could be a racial issue. While I understand that the history of the area I cannot believe the incredible distrust of charter schools and the heavy racism was quite discouraging. It shows that although much progress has been made in other parts of the country there are still too many people that see only color. Charter schools are the ultimate option to have control over your child's education if you aren't able to pay for private school. My kids have gone to charter schools that were far superior to the neighborhood schools both in terms of academics and school culture as there was much less violence. Also because charter schools draw families that strongly value the education of their children we have families from a wide variety of races and cultures at the school. My sons learned a great deal of valuable academics and they learned to see people not color. In my area children attending charter schools routinely out perform the schools district and the state. My son's school manages to do so even with a fairly high percentage of ESL and free/reduced lunch students which shows that the school is successfully assisting students from at risk families to succeed.
Mississippi don't you think it's time to move forward and try something new for the sake of the children? If the existing teachers are committed, have the needed skills and they can garner support among parents then they can open their own charter schools and they can get help from others if they are willing to move past color and accept assistance from various organizations that exist to help charter schools get started. Granted they will want to do some research to make sure the offer is genuine but there are supporting organizations out there so they don't have to recreate the wheel. They can learn from others and make it a smoother and more successful process.