Equity and Urban Schools

When I was growing up in Connecticut, there was a case being tried called Sheff vs. O'Neill. The premise being argued was that students in Hartford were receiving a separate AND unequal education. The cause of this was the district lines that prevented Hartford students from entering the more affluent, and better performing, suburban schools. While the case was started in 1988, and appealed on 2+ occasions since, Hartford students still languish at or near the bottom of statistical measures in CT and the district is 94% black or Latino.

Seattle Public Schools have similar issues with the achievement gap, as well as homogeneous schools within the district itself. On Tuesday the district is going to announce a restructuring, and the likelihood is that buildings will be closed. Schools are going to grow, perhaps as big as 500 students. I also wonder whether more scripted pacing guides are in the future, like other large urban school districts. Whether in Hartford or Seattle, are we fulfilling the promise of Brown, and the idea of an equitable public education? Do the kids in Hartford or Seattle get the same education as a student in Simsbury CT or Mercer Island WA? Is it enough for us to simply say it isn't fair or equitable?

Open Says-a-me!

I have been thinking about equality myself. Working in a special education classroom in a more affluent area has provoked many questions for me. Is it right that one school receives a grant for $60K while other schools don't? Is it right that the special education students are in a wing away from all of the other students in the school? Are those students getting the same education that other students their age, in the school, are getting?

That doesn't even get into the ideas of homework, after school programs, and physical structural issues. The one thing that is clear to me is that there are schools with more resources than others. Some might argue that those schools have gained some of their resources, the 60K grant for example, through their own hard work. But even the idea of extra resources brings up issues of inequity caused by access and gatekeeping.

It makes me wonder how the playing field can be leveled? How can schools in less affluent areas create similar networks of volunteers and money? How can they be given the access that they are seemingly denied? It also makes me wonder whether those are questions that need to remain latent for me, as a student-teacher, because it is beyond my scope?! Should I not actively worry about those questions, the questions that are systemic in nature, and focus on the change I can affect as a classroom teacher? It is a struggle of wanting to move a mountain but only being able to move a few wheelbarrows of dirt.

Equality is fiction.

Okay, so I admit I am going through some emotional times and so I am feeling unusually analytical- like deep, sometimes cheesy, sometimes harsh, contemplating life sort of stuff. That was your warning in case you weren't sure.

I have been thinking deeply about the inconsistencies of life and about the inequality of nature. I have been asking myself about the nature of equality and thinking in fact that the "nature" of equality is a paradox; nature is not equal, there is nothing equal about it. Everything in nature is set up to serve an overall cycle that includes individuals (of all species) serving ultimately as prey to some other predator. Go with me for a minute on this self-indulgent journey, just humor me.

How can we possibly have equality, perhaps equality of opportunity in particular, in education when we require children to do activities, homework outside of school in environments which are not equal in work space, in parent or family resources, in size, in study area, in materials, or in parent involvement? How can we possibly have equality when each of us is born and raised with traits and characteristics that are deemed valuable or detrimental by the larger society? How can we possibly expect equality in education in the form of all children passing the WASL or other standardized tests when it is a given of nature that we are all different (and unequal) in every way (looks, talents, abilities, learning styles, development, interests, preferences, dreams, drive, etc.)? You can standardize tests, but you can't standardize results because you can't standardize the most important variable: students, people, personalities.

Aside from nature's dealing of cards there is human influence that further expands and makes obvious the inequalities of people. How can we expect equality in education when we don't even give children the right to equality of health care? Don't we know as an "educated" bunch that a child, or an adult for the matter, cannot really focus on learning (and other such non-essential functions) until their basic needs - food, water, shelter, and physical safety- are met? Didn't we learn this from Maslow? If you do not have food or water or the physical things that keep you alive don't you agree that education seems a little superfluous?

How can we possibly expect equality of education when our entire ruling fundamental of life in the states is capitalism, a system based on INEQUALITY (inequality of materials, of goods, of quality food, of money, of power, and indeed of opportunity) and competition? If every child succeeded equally in school where would it get us as a capitalist country anyway? Doesn't this simply push educational inflation? That is, the notion that once upon a time families had one working parent and high school degrees and then people began to have two working parents and additional training to get ahead and then people held two jobs and a Bachelor's degree and now to just to stay afloat most families MUST have two working parents and to make anything more than ends meat both must have Bachelor's degrees or beyond. While this may seem great, an educated population, for a global economy, it does little but make us education-poor as individuals in this country. It does not bode well for many of us individually, it only makes the competition harder, the game of life tougher.

I wonder too if it is our right, our responsibility, or none of our business, as educators and businessmen and politicians to push educational goals on children. I understand that it is our intention to do what is best for the child to prepare them in their youth for the opportunity to make decisions for themselves in their young adulthood, to ensure that they have a full range of options to choose from when they get to that point. However, it also seems that there are some families who for cultural reasons or other reasons do not identify wholly with the pursuit to place education first in their lives and in the lives of their children. Is this neglect? Or is this the right of a parent who has their own ideals for the children?

Another word about equality is impossible. Even as you put in place programs to help some (children in schools, but also adults with social programs) you inevitably disable others or make others feel cheated, either for the work they have done to get ahead or because the help available to them is not the same, or equal, as it is to others. As you help the wolf population to recover from excessive hunting you are no doubt disabling the deer or the rabbit or others. This domino affect is the nature of things, the nature of nature, and nature, to reiterate, is not equal.

If we consider ourselves above or beyond allowing natural selection to take its course, if we feel the need as a "civilized" society to intervene then why do we seem okay about letting people slowly suffer through a world of denied respect, denied living wages, and especially denied medical care? That seems at least as harsh. I am not saying that we shouldn't care or shouldn't help, but I am questioning how much good our interventions really do and I am saying that our societal priorities are completely out of whack and that we, as educators and individuals, are out whack if we honestly believe that true equality of opportunity is possible. Even as I write this I am feeling sacrilegious because I feel like it is a known part of the job description that teachers should be hopeful and optimistic and strive for better, but sometimes I think we all need a little dose of reality.