As with many other state funded programs we have studied this
semester in “Race, Gender and the Welfare State,” education in Seattle has some
serious weaknesses and only families who can supplemented what the state
provides end up with satisfactory results.
So the question “What to do about our public schools?” is one
of the most popular topics for local politicians and journalists to discuss
even though there is a proven solution: Rainier Scholars. In this post, I’ll
tell you a bit more about the “achievement gap” then I’ll go through Rainier
Scholars’ methods for closing that gap. After that I will give some historical
background to the racial make up of Seattle’s schools and link this situation
to Katznelson’s theory from “When affirmative Action Was White.” I will conclude
with a proposal for eliminating the achievement gap.
Here are some statistics:
·
In the class of 2008, less than 50% of African
American and Native American students graduated on time, whereas more than 75%
of white students did (SRSJI).
·
43% of African American and 50% of Native
American 3rd graders did not meet state standards for reading during the
2010-11 school year (SRSJI)
·
Only about half of Samoan, Native American,
Latino and African American students graduate from Seattle Public
Schools (SRSJI).
·
While students of color compose 2/3rds of all
students in the Seattle School district, by high school they make up just 10
percent of the students in the district’s advanced learning programs
(Rainier Scholars).
Students, often from low income, minority families, are blamed
for this “achievement gap” in thinly-veiled, racist terms. There is some
insinuation in the question “why is that minority children are underachieving?
that the students are somehow not as smart or hard working as the high-achieving
students, who are statistically more likely to be white. But as professor
Bensonsmith said, “When there are big gaps in statistics between groups, we
must look for the institutional failing.”
Rainier Scholars works to close the gap. This rationale was
taken from their website and it relates the program back to a conception of a
just society. “Whatever the cause of that disparity, the outcome is clear: Fewer
of Seattle’s students of color get the education and mentoring they need to
gain admission to college and become leaders as adults. The
disproportionately low numbers of students of color on college campuses, as
well as the lack of men and women of color in positions of leadership
nationwide, point back to a lack of equitable opportunities at a
foundational level. Education and opportunity for all committed and
capable students is essential for a strong, just society. That’s
why we created Rainier Scholars.”
But I want you to ask yourselves, if opportunity is not being
provide for all, should the non-profit sector be the answer?
The Rainier scholars program begins with the results of the
fourth grade WASL. Every student in the district who passes the reading section
gets a letter introducing them to the program during their fifth grade year. Those
who come from families which face societal barriers to college are invited to
apply. Eighty percent of Rainier
Scholars students come from low-income families and 85% will be first
generation college graduates. Parents of prospective students are invited
to attend information sessions, which have translators in Chinese, Spanish,
Vietnamese, Somali, Amharic and Tigrigna.
I interviewed a friend who went through this the program for
this project, and I’d like to tell you what she said about each stage:
“For
phase one, along with summer school for 5th and 6th we
also had Saturday school. During the 6th grade year I applied to
private schools and AP program and rainier scholars was the one which
transferred that knowledge to my family. They’re really a comprehensive, detail
oriented program. For example, they taught me Latin during the recess part of
the summer program because they knew my middle school, Explorer West, offered
it and since I’d be coming in 7th grade they didn’t want me to be
behind….
…They
emphasize the importance of work and of trying hard and of perseverance and of
not giving up because things don’t go your way the entire time. They are with
you until you graduate from college, there’s a lot of academic enrichment
programs all around through college, but it makes sure students are ok
throughout whole educational experience. I’m only the 2nd generation
so we’re still guinea pigs….
…I never
imagined going to a private school, made me and my family aware that the
opportunity existed. It has had such a positive impact on me, haven’t had a lot
of time to sit down and critique it…
…They had academic counselors come to my high school once a
month to check in, someone still calls me once a month to ask me how I’m doing.
Especially for a lot of students who were the smartest kids in their middle
school, it is really easy to still try to figure everything out yourself. They
did a great job reminding people that its ok to ask for help and have a tutor.
They also have a counselor on staff to deal with emotional/psychological issues
which come up; the counselor deals with students AND their families. Rainier
Scholars really understand that it takes the entire family to make sure
students are successful in their academic career: parents need to make sure the
kids are doing their doing their homework, they have to organize carpools,
check their homework planners, etc…Rainier Scholars makes sure the parents are
doing all of that stuff and going to parent-teacher conferences….
…Rainier Scholars is all about transferring social capital—a
lot of people lack that, even at college. Students of color who had a program
like Rainier Scholars behind them learned how to navigate white spaces (so it
is not their first time in college) because that would be the worst time to
face this! We [students of color] are away from our family and finances are
often stressful, and students don’t understand completely why they feel the way
they do. I’ve been able to help out other Latinas, because I have been there.
However, the program needs to create a way for us [Rainier
Scholars students] to be able to talk to each other during the school year so
we can be a support system for each other.
…Rainier scholars had college counselors, financial aid; I found
out about [the college I now attend] through Rainier Scholars, internship
program for sophomores. Interned at a law firm in downtown. Becoming very well
known, because the city is so huge on diversity right now. It is really scary
to almost be tokenized. That’s a huge tension, to some extent its good for me,
but even being here, sometimes feel like I’m here because the college needed
women of color, there is that feeling of why am I here?
But when it comes down to it, that’s when I need to be most
engaged. You need to be more than ever engaged…
…Rainier
Scholars had a huge impact on my life…as the 1st generation in my
family to attend college and as a Latina….If you look at the racial gap its
really evident that the public school system isn’t doing what its supposed to
be doing which is offering a quality education to everyone regardless of
socioeconomic status…”
Funding Information:
The institution is financially backed by 30 corporate
sponsors, including: Microsoft, JP Morgan, Safeco Insurance, Google, Wells
Fargo, Goldman Sachs as well as private individuals. It has received
considerable media coverage in Seattle [see sources below] and is one of the
most well known non-profits in the city.
Ira Katznelson’s theory relates to this issue because there is
an institutional failing which has never been corrected. The Scholars program
has been successful in addressing this issue, but I believe the city has a
responsibility to provide vouchers for similar programs or private tutoring to
close this gap which they have created.
Check out Ira Katznelson, “When Affirmative Action Was White”
here: http://www.historyandpolicy.org/papers/policy-paper-36.html
Lets look at some maps which show the historic distribution of
African Americans and whites in the city. This first map shows the center of
the city in 1939…http://depts.washington.edu/civilr/segregation_maps.htm
Now, lets look a more recent maps: http://depts.washington.edu/civilr/segregation_maps.htm
This map shows that the lowest concentration of white people
in 2000 was the central and southern part of the city, whereas this map shows
that the highest concentration of African Americans lived in this area.
The city has always been very divided by neighborhood. The
southern and central part of the city have historically and to this day had the
highest proportion of African Americans.
Seattle has long struggled with the “achievement gap.” One way
the district tried to mediate the awkwardness surrounding the fact that
children from lower income, predominantly minority areas are assigned to their
neighborhood schools, which often are low-performing, was through a weak
affirmative action policy. This policy essentially said that if two students,
one white and one non-white applied to attend a school which did not have
enough room for both, the student who belong to the racial group
underrepresented at the school would get the spot. A group of parents sued the
district under the equal protection clause and the case went all the way to the
supreme court, where the justices decided in a 5-4 decision that because
Seattle Schools had never been EXPLICITELY segregated, the State did not have a
responsibility to desegregate them.
Similarly, lets look at a map of elementary schools in the Seattle
area. http://www.schooldigger.com/go/WA/city/Seattle/search.aspx
The balloons represent schools on a 1-5 scale, 5 being the
best and 1 being the worst. Adjust the map so that only elementary schools in
the Seattle school district rated between 0-1 stars are shown.
As you can see, the schools in the worst neighborhoods are
predominantly black and minority. We can use Katznelson’s theory to argue that
the city has a responsibility to address this failing because they caused
specific harm by allowing neighborhood home owners alliances to have racist
buying covenants which persisted in Seattle until 1968 (link). Almost every
neighborhood barred African Americans from buying or renting area homes (in
fact, the only people of color allowed in some neighborhoods were maids). Thus, the city was complicit in the
segregation of the neighborhoods even if they didn’t pass a law mandating
segregation, they allowed housing discrimination. It follows that if children
go to their neighborhood schools, these schools will reflect the neighborhood
racial composition and thus be racially segregated as well. The specific harm
comes from the fact that these schools, like Brown vs. the Board of education
were never “separate but equal” and in fact, to this day persist in being
unequal (as do racially divided neighborhoods). However, since the city never
MANDATED that they be separate, the supreme court did not find that the city
had a duty to correct for any harm caused by their inequality. The majority
opinion of the Supreme Court fails to take into account the
realities/nuance/truth of the situation.
But our city can, and
has a moral obligation to do better for all kids. Rainier Scholars can only
take 60 kids each year. The city has recently launched a Race and Social
Justice Initiative, which is pursuing the following three goals:
1. Every schoolchild,
regardless of language and cultural differences, receives a quality education
and feels safe and included.
2. Race does not
predict how much you earn or your chance of being homeless or going to prison.
3. African American,
Latinos and Native Americans can expect to live as long as white people.
I am pleased that
Seattle is pursuing this initiative which aims to “lead a collaborative,
community-wide effort to eliminate racial inequity in education, criminal
justice, environmental justice, health and economic success,” but I’m concerned
that this program will also fall short of what’s needed to achieve this goal.
I believe the initiative needs to fund widespread Rainier Scholars-type
programs to meet its stated goal of providing quality education to all students
(and indirectly affecting the other two). A new “educational welfare” program
is needed to eliminate institutionalized racism—non-profits cannot meet
demonstrated public need.
See also:
www.rainierscholars.org
Large, Jerry. “Program
Bridges Gap” The Seattle Times March 11 2012
“Rainier Scholars is a
praiseworthy bandage on a wounded system. It is one of many programs, each with
its own niche. Healing the system ought to be the goal, and programs like this
show what medicines work best. When I say system, I don't just mean schools,
but how the community affects children from conception to adulthood. Housing,
health care, neighborhood safety, the whole package. Education is only part of
that, but a central part.”
Seattle Race and Social
Justice Initiative: http://www.seattle.gov/rsji/
