istjohn, I deeply appreciate your question. I've been sitting here for over an hour trying to answer so I'll just answer simply. Yes, I would rather have gone to a school in my neighborhood. I would have rather been around other African American and LatinX students than to have learned what it is to be neglected and to feel inferior @ 4.5 years old. No question.
Please don't use my response as an argument in support of segregation. That would be purely evil and disgusting.
Thank you for sharing your experience. I'm sorry you had to go through that.
I believe the racial segregation in our country is an enormous injustice that gets short shrift in public conversation. It's so pervasive in our society that we don't even see it anymore. It's role in education is particularly pernicious. I live in Columbus, Ohio, which like many northern cities has an underfunded, poorly performing, mostly black and brown school district in its core flanked all around by well-funded, high-performing, mostly white school districts. My son's elementary school last year had 82% students of color and two miles away in another school district was a public elementary with 9% students of color.
I did some research to understand how things came to be like this in my city, and of course, it’s the typical story of white flight after Brown v. Board of Education. But what surprised me, a white person, was the historical and continuing ambivalence in the local black community with bussing as a solution to racial inequality in education. And I’ve seen that ambivalence expressed elsewhere, too. I was told that prior to Brown v. Board there were excellent all-black public schools. Then Brown v. Board triggered white flight, which drained all the resources from the city core, and eventually even middle class black families who could afford to, got out. The answer is not bussing, not integration, I was told by one thought-leader in the local black community, but quality, well-funded community schools.
I struggle to accept that answer because I know the data shows that minority students benefit hugely when their schools are not segregated. Yet I understand why sending kids to schools that aren’t in their community and where they may not be welcome is problematic. I wonder if the ideal solution isn’t a bussing program that is just as likely to bus a white kid to a black school as a black kid to a white school. But the program would need to be robust enough to prevent or adapt to white flight. Or maybe we should focus our energy on residential economic and racial segregation which, if solved, would also solve the educational segregation issue. I don’t know.
In any case, I’d love to hear any thoughts you might have.
I agree with you, but I don't have too much more to add. From birth non-blacks (and blacks alike) are classically conditioned by numerous socio-environmental stimuli to believe that blacks are inferior. I believe that all other issues discussed in this thread are based that unfortunate foundation. And that foundation is, of course, based on the tragic history of our country with respect to race relations.
Do you believe that forced integration is more often worse for individual nonwhite children, but a net improvement for both the minority community & society as a whole?
Please don't use my response as an argument in support of segregation. That would be purely evil and disgusting.