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     Jerry Moore (Admin) Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 30937 Registered: 01-2000  Rating: N/A |
Conn. Schools Deal With Race Imbalance Associated Press / WALL STREET JOURNAL Oct. 28, 2012 HARTFORD—The emotionally charged issues of race and education are on the agendas of several Connecticut school boards as officials struggle to seek state-mandated racial balance at elementary schools. * * * The plans, which can take about six months from the time they're submitted to when they're approved by the state, can include building magnet schools that draw in students or redrawing school boundary lines. New boundaries are rarely welcomed by parents and children who are attached to neighborhood schools. * * * * 
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| Jerry Moore (Admin) Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 27859 Registered: 01-2000 Rating: N/A |
Court Stops Funding Cuts to Arkansas Schools Associated Press via the WALL STREET JOURNAL June 21, 2011 LITTLE ROCK, Ark.—A federal appeals court Tuesday temporarily set aside a lower judge's ruling to cut most of Arkansas' desegregation funding to three Little Rock-area school districts, a move that likely means the payments will continue through the start of the upcoming school year. * * * *
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| Jerry Moore (Admin) Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 27815 Registered: 01-2000 Rating: N/A |
Judge Jolts Little Rock Ruling Cuts Money Meant to Desegregate Schools in City at Center of 1957 Fight By LESLIE EATON / WALL STREET JOURNAL JUNE 16, 2011 U.S. District Court Judge Brian S. Miller, who oversees the districts' federally ordered desegregation efforts, found the payments were "proving to be an impediment to true desegregation" by rewarding school systems that don't meet their long-standing commitments. Judge Miller's recent rulings triggered protests by the school districts. But some lawmakers and state officials hailed the decision to shut off the payments, which totaled roughly $1 billion over the past two decades. * * * *
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| Jerry Moore (Admin) Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 27543 Registered: 01-2000 Rating: N/A |
It’s all about connecting with students By Rod Watson / Buffalo News April 28, 2011 Eva Doyle spent 30 years in Buffalo classrooms and knows that something is wrong in the predominantly African-American district with the lousy results for students of color. But unlike many others, she has a concrete first step: She wants to bring to Buffalo the author of “Countering the Conspiracy to Destroy Black Boys.” “With the crisis we have in education, and I do feel it’s a crisis, . . . I felt we needed to hear another voice,” said Doyle, who in 25 years at Campus West had already used techniques like those in the book to reach “unreachable” kids. No, the book wasn’t written by Superintendent James Williams, whose contention that public schools were never meant to educate black kids has put educators in the cross hairs of parents. It is among several written by educational consultant Jawanza Kunjufu for parents and educators open-minded enough to realize they need to change an approach that’s not working. “We need different ways of reaching the at-risk student,” said Doyle, who recalled rearranging her classroom to accommodate “hyperactive” boys who needed to move around. She would bend the rules rather than penalize kids for their learning style. That’s a central theme in Kunjufu’s work, as he explores differences ignored by too many teachers who shunt black boys off to special education or suspension in disproportionate numbers rather than try different teaching methods. In a phone interview, Kunjufu noted that black parents have a vital role to play, including cutting off the TV and rap music and making kids study. But what happens in the classroom also is key in a district where parents complain that only a quarter of black males graduate. Why so few? Kunjufu argues that many white teachers aren’t prepared for the cultural differences. For instance, the black extended family with relatives constantly in and out of the house, multiple radios and TVs blaring and the active inner-city street environment produce kids used to functioning amid a high degree of stimuli rather than studying alone in a quiet room. Female teachers, many from the suburbs, who don’t grasp the cultural differences— or find such boys intimidating —can be too quick to write them off. It may not be that such kids are hyperactive, Kunjufu writes, but that “the curriculum is too slow.” He notes that such kids are easily engaged by video games and other stimulative activities. What they may need are fewer lectures and more hands-on learning.  The curriculum is too slow for most students. That’s what Doyle learned in her career, and why she wants to bring Kunjufu to Buffalo. A fundraiser from 6 to 10 p. m. Saturday in the Frank E. Merriweather Jr. Library will include poetry, a video featuring Kunjufu and a panel discussion in an effort to raise enough money to pull off the June 13 forum. Amid calls for school boycotts and turning schools over to a dysfunctional state government, Doyle’s focus directly on what’s happening in the classroom makes as much sense as anything. “It’s not the be-all and end-all,” she said, “but it’s one more piece.” Given that the district is 56 percent African-American and 15 percent Hispanic, teaching in ways that reach those kids instead of pursuing the same failed approaches is not just one piece of the puzzle, it’s the piece.
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| Jerry Moore (Admin) Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 26863 Registered: 01-2000 Rating: N/A |
School defends experiment to separate black students in a bid to boost their academic results By London (UK) Daily Mail Reporter with over 35 comments 27th January 2011 A high school has defended its decision to segregate students by race and gender. The scheme, at McCaskey East High School in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, separates black students from the rest of the school pupils, and then further breaks it down into black females and black males. The separation is only for a short period - six minutes each day and 20 minutes twice a month - but it has drawn criticism for raising the spectre of racial segregation. Today the school's principal defended the policy. Bill Jimenez said the school noticed that black students were not performing as well as other students, and that research had shown that same-race classes with strong same-race role models led to better academic results. Mr Jimenez admitted that no other students were divided by race at the school, but he added that academic data dictated the school take a different approach with its black students. He told Lancasteronline.com: 'One of the things we said when we did this was, "Let's look at the data, let's not run from it. Let's confront it and see what we can do about it".' * * * *
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| Jerry Moore (Admin) Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 26652 Registered: 01-2000 Rating: N/A |
Words perpetuate a stereotype An Albany (NY) Times Union Letter to the Editor December 19, 2010 I was disappointed in the Dec. 5 front-page article "Fighting a word," to find the unsupported statement: "Closing the achievement gap between black students and their peers is a daily struggle in classrooms across the United States." While this may be true in some schools, I find it hard to believe in its universality as the staff writer suggests. More importantly, seeing the statement in print in a respected newspaper perpetuates a stereotype that is offensive to thinking Americans and encourages the racial intolerance discussed in the article. DOUGLAS A. HUGHES Saratoga Springs Good point. While perpetuating one stereotype it was avoiding another. Almost all of the gap in academic performance on government exams is explained by black males. And while the black/white gap may not be universal, it is pervasive.
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| Jerry Moore (Admin) Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 26106 Registered: 01-2000 Rating: N/A |
Students' SAT Scores Stay in Rut By STEPHANIE BANCHERO / WALL STREET JOURNAL with over 100 comments SEPTEMBER 14, 2010 See, also, Average SAT scores fluctuate slightly within class of 2010, at USA Today, which includes a table of scores by demographics. High school students' performance on the SAT college-entrance exam remained mostly unchanged from last year, except for notable gains by Asian-Americans, who continue to outperform all other test takers. Overall, the average score for the graduating class of 2010 in reading remained at 501; climbed in math to 516 from 515; and dropped in writing to 492 from 493, according to scores released Monday. The combined overall score of 1509 out of a possible 2400 matched last year's tally, which was the lowest since the writing exam was added to the SAT battery in 2006. The sole bright spot was the performance of Asian-Americans. They posted a three-point gain in reading, a four-point jump in math, and a six-point gain in writing over their 2009 scores. * * * SAT scores are closely watched because the standardized test measures the achievement of students who hope to attend America's top colleges. More than 1.5 million students from this year's graduating class took the exam. Each subject is scored on a scale of 200 to 800 points. About 42% of test takers were minorities, the highest nonwhite percentage ever to sit for the exam. Non-Asian minorities continued to perform far below white students. African-Americans, for example, posted an average reading score of 429, compared with 528 for whites. * * * * martin heilweil wrote:as a statistician in one of my former lives i always try to read these statistical reports closely...
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| Jerry Moore (Admin) Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 23811 Registered: 01-2000 Rating: N/A |
Still Separate, Still Unequal? Change.org has an excellent series on race disparities in public education. Introduction The Case of Special Education The Case of Gifted and Talented Education The Case of Digital Equity in Education
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