A Return to Neighborhood Schools

There will be much discussion on returning to neighborhood schools; I will examine some predictable arguments against neighborhood schools.

Returning to neighborhood schools:

1. Is unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court decision of Brown vs. the Board of Education did not stipulate the school districts needed to bus children across town in order to achieve diversity, it mandated that schools could not bar enrollment based on the child’s ethnicity.

2. Will eliminate the very popular RUSD magnet schools.
This is a real possibility, after all how can the inner city children return to their “neighborhood school” if the school is full of non-neighborhood children. We must remember why the magnet schools were created in the first place – they were created to draw the children from the outlying suburban areas to the inner-city. While some of these magnet schools have become a haven for the upwardly-mobile suburban residents, others like Red Apple Elementary still function like it was intended.

I am obviously biased, but Red Apple is the best example of what is a magnet school should be. There are MANY children from the surrounding neighborhood attending the school, yet there are still families like mine from the suburbs who choose to send their children there. The school is racially diverse (meeting RUSD’s voluntary desegregation policy) and consistently scores above district and state averages on the WCKE. Why is this? I think it is all about expectations. The parents sign a compact before enrolling their children, promising to be part of their child’s learning. The teachers and staff have high expectations for ALL the children, as do the parents. Schools like Red Apple need to be located throughout the district, making integration a more natural phenomenon.

3. Will create an environment of low-performing “minority” schools.
This is also another possibility, but it can be addressed. Julian Thomas, a majority-minority school located in the central city has created an extremely successful environment for these children to learn. It can certainly be replicated throughout the district. The school receives additional funding, the best teachers and has the added benefit of great parental support. I do not believe that inner-city children need to sit next to a suburban one to learn, I think it is (again!) all about expectations. If we think a child will fail; he most likely will. It should have nothing to do with the color of the child’s skin or the size of his parents’ pocketbook.