The Desegregation and Re-segregation of Charlotte's Schools (renting, how much)
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Good article that is especially prescient as a context and background when considering the source of public outcry for more equitable treatment from Charlotte's poorest citizens.
"In 1971, the Supreme Court upheld the decision, and Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education concretized what Brown v. Board had put into motion more than a decade before. District after district modeled its integration plans on Charlotte, and the city was lauded as an example of what successful integration could look like. By 1980, the school district had reached an unprecedented level of integration. In 1984, the Charlotte Observer editorial board stated, “Charlotte-Mecklenburg’s proudest achievement of the past 20 years is not the city’s impressive new skyline or its strong, growing economy. Its proudest achievement is its fully integrated schools.”
The success of the integration program lasted for almost three decades, until William Capacchione, a white parent, sued the school district because he believed his daughter was not admitted into a local magnet school because of her race. Over the course of the trial, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school board forcefully defended its desegregation plan. But in 1999 Federal District Court Judge Robert Potter—who as a private citizen had been active in the anti-busing movement of the nineteen-sixties—ordered the district to stop using race in pupil assignments. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, fearful of seeing three decades of desegregation work wiped away, appealed the decision. However, in 2001 the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Capacchione and the other parents who joined him on the case, ending the mandatory-busing program.
Under the new “Family Choice Plan,” students were largely made to attend the schools in their neighborhood. But most neighborhoods in Charlotte are deeply segregated and racially homogenous communities, as a result of decades of housing segregation, and so schools that were once integrated and high-achieving soon became stratified by race and income. In 2005, as part of a separate, and far-reaching, case originally brought against the state of North Carolina for its failing school system, Judge Howard Manning issued a report on the state of schools in Charlotte. He concluded, “The most appropriate way for the Circuit to describe what is going on academically at CMS’s bottom ‘8’ high schools is academic genocide for the at-risk, low-income children.”
When Charlotte-Mecklenburg eliminated race as a factor in student assignment, it not only meant less diverse schools; it also created a feedback loop that made the problem worse. Families with the means—most often white families—started to move into whiter neighborhoods, where they knew their kids would go to whiter schools. As a result of the relationship between race and wealth, the social, political, and economic capital became ever more concentrated in a small number of very white neighborhoods."
i dont have a problem with people moving to white aread for schools.
my beef is with those who move inside 277, brag about diversity and being around Black folk then start a charter school or send their kids to private school.
Don't be fooled into believing that forced busing solved the education problem. It did not.
When parents take responsibility for their children and teach them morals and the value of education things will change.
We have the same problems now that we did 30 years ago. It does not help to throw more and more money at schools if parents are not supportive of their kids education. Black kids do not have to sit next to white kids to learn. We do not need to spend more money on buses - instead lets spend it on teacher pay for better teachers.
The problem begins and ends with the parents.
Don't have kids if you aren't able and willing to raise them.
Don't be fooled into believing that forced busing solved the education problem. It did not.
When parents take responsibility for their children and teach them morals and the value of education things will change.
We have the same problems now that we did 30 years ago. It does not help to throw more and more money at schools if parents are not supportive of their kids education. Black kids do not have to sit next to white kids to learn. We do not need to spend more money on buses - instead lets spend it on teacher pay for better teachers.
The problem begins and ends with the parents.
Don't have kids if you aren't able and willing to raise them.
It certainly was a more equitable system than the one we've got now. While I would argue the public schools are indeed great when considered in whole, there are some schools that have been dismantled due to the end of busing for desegregation.
You're right that many parents are overburdened in poverty for numerous reasons, but I'm not sure what impact your brow beating or the more affluent community's negligence will have. Telling these kids their parents shouldn't have had them isn't very helpful.
No matter how much you pay a teacher, a class full of poor black kids is set up for failure from the start and we have too many of those in Charlotte in the re-segregated system. Black kids actually do show tremendous gains when placed in more diverse classrooms and white students are proven to benefit too.
It certainly was a more equitable system than the one we've got now. While I would argue the public schools are indeed great when considered in whole, there are some schools that have been dismantled due to the end of busing for desegregation.
You're right that many parents are overburdened in poverty for numerous reasons, but I'm not sure what impact your brow beating or the more affluent community's negligence will have. Telling these kids their parents shouldn't have had them isn't very helpful.
No matter how much you pay a teacher, a class full of poor black kids is set up for failure from the start and we have too many of those in Charlotte in the re-segregated system. Black kids actually do show tremendous gains when placed in more diverse classrooms and white students are proven to benefit too.
I have friends that were raised dirt poor but their parents taught them the value of education and they are now productive citizens. Being poor or black doesn't give a parent the right to abdicate parental responsibilities.
I realize that due to the current welfare system, there are too many kids with loser parents. I raised my kids as a single mother and I volunteered in the public schools. I worked two jobs and had virtually no help from my deadbeat ex but I raised my kids to be respectful and to value education. I was 'poor' and worked my fanny off to pay the bills and spend time with my kids. It was damn hard but it was my responsibility.
I don't know what the answer is but I do know that spending money on buses and sending kids past their neighborhood schools and across town is not the answer. That leads to even more distance between the family and their school community. The parents have to be involved for their children to succeed.
I have friends that were raised dirt poor but their parents taught them the value of education and they are now productive citizens. Being poor or black doesn't give a parent the right to abdicate parental responsibilities.
I realize that due to the current welfare system, there are too many kids with loser parents. I raised my kids as a single mother and I volunteered in the public schools. I worked two jobs and had virtually no help from my deadbeat ex but I raised my kids to be respectful and to value education. I was 'poor' and worked my fanny off to pay the bills and spend time with my kids. It was damn hard but it was my responsibility.
I don't know what the answer is but I do know that spending money on buses and sending kids past their neighborhood schools and across town is not the answer. That leads to even more distance between the family and their school community. The parents have to be involved for their children to succeed.
Kudos to you and your success. I agree with you in principle. Personal responsibility is indeed a criteria for any form of success. I'm not talking about handouts or entitlements. There are many responsible parents that have students in the classrooms that are set for failure. Some are not as well.
I simply know that comparing the success of desegregated schools through busing was favorable in whole compared to what we see today. I was one of the children bused to desegregate and earned a stellar education. The school is now a shell of it's former self. It is more expensive to pour money into schools through line items outside of transportation. Charlotte ranks 50/50 in economic mobility due to this negligence. Is your solution to ignore this reality?
You are all correct about throwing money at the issue.
I know a neighboring school system to Char-Meck is spending as much as 18 times more on at-risk schools in their district (combination of special Fed, State, local funding with several grants from think tanks, drastically smaller class sizes, etc.), with little or no achievement gap change.
Kudos to you and your success. I agree with you in principle. Personal responsibility is indeed a criteria for any form of success. I'm not talking about handouts or entitlements. There are many responsible parents that have students in the classrooms that are set for failure. Some are not as well.
I simply know that comparing the success of desegregated schools through busing was favorable in whole compared to what we see today. I was one of the children bused to desegregate and earned a stellar education. The school is now a shell of it's former self. It is more expensive to pour money into schools through line items outside of transportation. Charlotte ranks 50/50 in economic mobility due to this negligence. Is your solution to ignore this reality?
I think without sufficient parental involvement we are fighting a losing battle. Kids with loser parents have very little chance at success. A few do come around on their own but most follow in their parents footsteps and most become a burden to our society.
I believe we need to hold parents accountable. Your children need to be in school, respect the teachers, obey the rules, do the classwork and homework, etc. Instead, parents want to blame everyone else for their children failing.
I was appalled at the behavior problems that I observed in schools. The kids are allowed to be disruptive with no accountability. I read an article in the Charlotte Observer stating that a study was made and 'too many black students are being suspended or expelled as compared to white students'. REALLY? What difference does it make what color your skin is - if you break the rules you should suffer the consequences. This just shows how crazy our society has become.
How are schools, teachers, etc. going to reach these kids when the parents don't even back the schools?
As a kid that grew up here in the 80's, I can tell you that busing is not the solution. Dr. Peter Relic started that pipe dream back in the day, as a means to "even up" the school system for poor kids. I agree that everyone deserves a fair chance to better themselves, but there has to be a different solution other than busing. All busing did for me as a middle class white kid was make my commute go from 15 minutes to almost an hour going across town everyday.
Oh, also, imagine being a white kid in Jr. High that was more than 70% black? I certainly caught my share of being bullied and beaten, only positive I can think of is that it taught me to stand up for myself pretty quickly. I had other friends in different school systems at the time, they were not a product of busing. Because of this, I really do believe they received a higher level of education than I did. It's tough to focus on books when you are worried about getting your a** kicked everyday. Just my 02.
I have friends that were raised dirt poor but their parents taught them the value of education and they are now productive citizens. Being poor or black doesn't give a parent the right to abdicate parental responsibilities.
I realize that due to the current welfare system, there are too many kids with loser parents. I raised my kids as a single mother and I volunteered in the public schools. I worked two jobs and had virtually no help from my deadbeat ex but I raised my kids to be respectful and to value education. I was 'poor' and worked my fanny off to pay the bills and spend time with my kids. It was damn hard but it was my responsibility.
I don't know what the answer is but I do know that spending money on buses and sending kids past their neighborhood schools and across town is not the answer. That leads to even more distance between the family and their school community. The parents have to be involved for their children to succeed.
You are absolutely correct. My wife grew up poor. She lived in a one bedroom house with her parents, sister and two brothers. There was no second bedroom nor inside plumbing until she went to middle school ( Jr. High school.) They never thought they were poor. She had great parents and her dad was always supportive, there, and worked hard. She earned academic scholarships through graduate school and was the first runner up for Junior Executive of the Year when she was 38.
The color thing drives me nuts. It is nothing but an excuse. The finger pointing is even more pathetic. Education is there for all. All one has to do is want to be educated and achieve. It is funny that Indians, Vietnamese, and other disadvantaged immigrant students excel and end up with scholarships. It is all about parenting. Disillusioned people really hurt the situation with the foolish notion that blacks can't excel without money spent specifically on them or the notion that they are not capable of existing without us. That liberal notion is extremely racist. Look at all of the black success stories that poor blacks have proven.
Also, despite what a posting said before, the education status in the Charlotte/Meckenburg schools began to deteriorate in 1971 after the forced desegregation law was enacted. Twenty years afterwords, several schools in the U.S. were investigated and it was found that after the billions of dollars spent, students showed absolutely no improvement in either the academic or the socialization resulting from the expensive cross city busing. The cities in the study were Charlotte, Minneapolis, San Francisco, Kansas City, Boston, Baltimore, and Denver.
Bottom line, it isn't the schools and it isn't desegregation. It is about motivation and that comes from the home. I know, I taught. Thank you Charlotteborn for being aware.
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