My problem is that I just don't know what to DO. I feel so helpless. That there are human beings who can speak about children the way those Frances Howell parents did -- I just...
I don't think this situation is the same either, though. It sounds like the the other mom had some issues with her. I would have been side eying her from the start for that ghetto comment (people who say that to me don't end up saying it more than once) and I agree she is very much like the Frances Howell parents, although the crazy thing is that her perfectly behaved children would have received the same reception from those parents. I don't take issue with people who don't want children who have behaved violently around their children. That's very different from not wanting children around because they are black, or poor, or test lower, or some combination thereof. Those parents knew very well that the Normandy children weren't coming because of behavioral issues, but because their schools had failed them and they desired a better education. They may have been using code language, but it ultimately came down to I don't want those poor black children around my children. That is my issue with them and the mother at your school. Now if the question is about a student or students who have and are continuing to behave violently, then I'd be the first one to be pissed because I don't do a zillion things to protect my child just to let some chucklefuck hurt him anyway. Some people have a problem with impoverished children having the same access that their children have, and that's disgusting.
Post by Black Lavender on Aug 5, 2015 18:25:43 GMT -5
I've really had to sit for awhile & let this marinate so that I could have a well thought out response to this foolishness. But I don't have one. I feel like i go to PTO meetings & field trips with parents like this. We have a local district that consistently underperforming (90% black) and I'm positive that if this happened to our (less than 1% black) district, that these people whose homes I'm at, who invite us to birthday & holiday parties would act like this and that's causing me some serious angst. I am 100% aware that the people I know haven't done anything remotely close to this (that i know of) and that I shouldn't give them the side eye, but that's just how I'm feeling right now. I feel like my family is just one situation away from being called the N word if/when something like this happens. All of these situations with race collectively just have created a feeling of helplessness that I never knew existed.
Hold on, did this bitch just say they didn't want the metrolink or some kind of public transportation option because they didn't want the "different communities" coming across and bringing problems? Is she serious with this shit? I may have to finish this at home where I can freely cuss and drink wine.
Yes. And iammalcolmx correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't this also a thing in ATL. Marta wasn't run all the way out because the suburban folks didn't want the folks associated with public transit out in their neighborhood.
Yes. And iammalcolmx correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't this also a thing in ATL. Marta wasn't run all the way out because the suburban folks didn't want the folks associated with public transit out in their neighborhood.
Same here. Prime example...Georgetown
I have actually heard that's an Urban myth and that back then they ran into structural issues so Georgetown was never considered.
I haven't listened to the episode and this is a little off subject but DD1 excelled in school when she was younger and tested for advanced classes after kindergarten. She was in a decent school and she really enjoyed it but I thought putting her into advanced classes would be a good idea. The advanced classes were only at schools in the impoverished areas of town (I was a single mom and poor myself at the time making just over minimum wage so I'm not saying anything bad about the poor, I also grew up very poor) and I had issues with it due to safety concerns with the violence in that area but gave it a chance. I believe they placed the advanced kids in those schools to bump up the testing scores for those schools. It's elementary school so how bad could it be?
It was bad. The area her school was in is in gang territory and that part of town is known for that. My kid cried every night because she didn't want to go to daycare the next day (daycare transported her to and from school so it was in the same area). She is a minority but looks white and was teased, bullied, and stolen from at the daycare she attended. She was only in first grade so she was a tiny thing that didn't know how to speak out. Her grades plummeted. At school she picked up some bad behaviors and vocabulary as well. I don't want to go into what it was she would write and say but it was extremely concerning. After awhile I pulled her from the school and daycare and placed her in another and almost immediately she changed. I don't think the kids in the school were bad at all, I mean they're little kids, but it was evident that they had very bad influences at home.
I'm interested in that podcast and plan to listen.
So let me preface this by saying I am not judging your decision to pull your child. I do want to address the teasing/bullying/being the "only" section of the post. I think a lot of white parents have these concerns. I see it on blogs here in my area. I will just say that where I grew up I was frequently the "only" in some of my classes and or activities. I think of the humiliation I felt when someone I thought was one of my closest friends invited all the girls in the class to her birthday party except for me because I was black because evidently I was fine to beget friend in school but not was not okay to be at her house. This repeated itself throughout school. Add to that comments about my hair or my skin or why do I look this way or that way. I say all this to say that bullying,l and teasing that goes along with being the "only" happens in good schools too. Minorities don't really have the luxury of saying..,nope. We just teach our kids to deal with it while still trying to instill self-esteem and self worth in out children. Again I am not saying you should have kept your daughter there. The violence alone would have been enough of a deterrent for me. But it makes me sad when concerns of being the only impede progress (again this is globally speaking not individually you).
I see that backfiring on her. Makes me wonder how many of their precious angel kids would get caught with drugs.
We had drug sniffing dogs at my almost 98% white private Catholic school. I can't say in all the years I was there that it was ever a black child caught. It was always, always the rich or upper middle class white kids. And in class, when we'd be locked down during the drug sniffing, it was never a black kid freaking the fuck out.
My other anecdote is that drugs were a much more common issue at the public high school near where I lived (out in the county/more rural/suburban) vs the school in the city. The breakdown there was also a huge majority of white well off kids in the county school.
I think that lady would be in for a rude awakening.
I finally had a chance to finish listening yesterday and was just in tears. Sobbing in the car on my way home. What bothers me most is that these individuals, in my opinion, honestly do not think that they are being racist. They don't see it that way, AND THAT IS SO FUCKED UP.
My district integrates and I think it's pretty smart how they do it.
We have traditionally been a neighborhood school type town. The north end of town has always been more upper middle class, and the south end has been lower middle class. Today, we have a high poverty number in the south end. It's really a strange town. We have million dollar homes on one end and then public housing on the other.
Anyway, years ago (early 90's) the town created a magnet school out of an old junior high. It focused on the arts, but followed the same curriculum as the rest of the district. They purposefully put the magnet school in a lower income area. Now, the magnet school is desirable because it has extra arts programs. It's a lottery based system that takes demographics into consideration, so the population there is mixed from all over town.
Here's where it gets smart...they still consider the magnet school a neighborhood school, so children within that district are "technically" supposed to attend the magnet school. However. if they don't get in through the lottery, they are distributed to the other schools in town. This allows the children living in the lowest income areas of town to attend the "more desirable" schools in the higher income areas.
All this being said, it's still just one district. So, its the same curriculum, and unfortunately our schools are still underfunded. So, many problems still exist, but it allows our schools to be more balanced in a fairly segregated community. Now, test scores are pretty equal in all schools rather than just the north end schools performing at higher levels and the south end schools struggling.
I haven't listened to the episode and this is a little off subject but DD1 excelled in school when she was younger and tested for advanced classes after kindergarten. She was in a decent school and she really enjoyed it but I thought putting her into advanced classes would be a good idea. The advanced classes were only at schools in the impoverished areas of town (I was a single mom and poor myself at the time making just over minimum wage so I'm not saying anything bad about the poor, I also grew up very poor) and I had issues with it due to safety concerns with the violence in that area but gave it a chance. I believe they placed the advanced kids in those schools to bump up the testing scores for those schools. It's elementary school so how bad could it be?
It was bad. The area her school was in is in gang territory and that part of town is known for that. My kid cried every night because she didn't want to go to daycare the next day (daycare transported her to and from school so it was in the same area). She is a minority but looks white and was teased, bullied, and stolen from at the daycare she attended. She was only in first grade so she was a tiny thing that didn't know how to speak out. Her grades plummeted. At school she picked up some bad behaviors and vocabulary as well. I don't want to go into what it was she would write and say but it was extremely concerning. After awhile I pulled her from the school and daycare and placed her in another and almost immediately she changed. I don't think the kids in the school were bad at all, I mean they're little kids, but it was evident that they had very bad influences at home.
I'm interested in that podcast and plan to listen.
So let me preface this by saying I am not judging your decision to pull your child. I do want to address the teasing/bullying/being the "only" section of the post. I think a lot of white parents have these concerns. I see it on blogs here in my area. I will just say that where I grew up I was frequently the "only" in some of my classes and or activities. I think of the humiliation I felt when someone I thought was one of my closest friends invited all the girls in the class to her birthday party except for me because I was black because evidently I was fine to beget friend in school but not was not okay to be at her house. This repeated itself throughout school. Add to that comments about my hair or my skin or why do I look this way or that way. I say all this to say that bullying,l and teasing that goes along with being the "only" happens in good schools too. Minorities don't really have the luxury of saying..,nope. We just teach our kids to deal with it while still trying to instill self-esteem and self worth in out children. Again I am not saying you should have kept your daughter there. The violence alone would have been enough of a deterrent for me. But it makes me sad when concerns of being the only impede progress (again this is globally speaking not individually you).
It was so hard to see her cry almost everyday after school and during bed time because of whatever it was she was going through at school and daycare. It affected her grades and she changed from a happy kid to a miserable one. I had the option to transfer her out since it wasn't her home school so I did. I chose for her to have a better school experience. Race seriously wasn't an issue or a concern to me as I am the same race as most of the people that attend that school and 99% of my friends are of the same race (I didn't have many white friends until I met current H and his friends). It was more about her bad experience and me not wanting her to have to deal with it. She wasn't transferred to a mostly white school (I don't even think there is one in my area of SoCal) but she did go to a school that worked out for her.
Minorities don't really have the luxury of saying..,nope. We just teach our kids to deal with it while still trying to instill self-esteem and self worth in out children. I had issues with this growing up. I never really felt like I fit in any group. I had to defend myself constantly with the only group I identified with, which is Hispanic because that's what I am. Because I don't quite look "right" in their eyes I was constantly questioned by adults and kids. The areas I grew up in had mostly a Hispanic population. I wouldn't say I was bullied but the experiences I had left me insecure about who I was. I never fit in with the white crowd because I was different from them too. My culture and upbringing was different and I couldn't connect. I didn't have the same experiences as you and I'm not trying to compare. I don't recall ever being denied a visit to a friend's house but I can understand a little about comments made about looks. Why was my skin the wrong color, why were my eyes this color instead of that, etc. I heard and still hear this constantly.
When DD was a little older she had some form from school she had to fill out and one of the questions was about race. She asked me what she was which surprised me since I thought she knew based on my last name and the fact that the family speaks Spanish. I've never hidden our race from her nor has my family but I don't think I ever had a discussion about it (maybe that's where I went wrong). Before I answered she said, "Eww, I hope I'm not Hispanic". That bothered me and we had a talk after. The county we live in has a public school enrollment of 60% Hispanic and her some of her friends were Hispanic. Obviously somewhere she picked up that being Hispanic was a bad thing. That saddened me.
Post by cookiemdough on Aug 6, 2015 22:20:38 GMT -5
Like I said, I don't judge your choices at all. I really don't. I just find all of the decisions parents have to make in this space unfortunate. In general putting attractive programs in underperforming schools imo does not work as well as allowing kids to go to schools in higher performing districts. But then we have the situation like discussed in the podcast where parents are like nooooo don't let those kids in my schools. I just don't know the answer. I do feel for those kids that don't have a choice. I think we are both lucky that we at least have options.