While I’m preparing for the trip, here is a very good article on how the seemingly innocuous term “neighborhood schools” conceals resegregation of the worst kind.
“Neighborhood Schools”
Opinions, art, debate
Opinions, art, debate
While I’m preparing for the trip, here is a very good article on how the seemingly innocuous term “neighborhood schools” conceals resegregation of the worst kind.
Clarissa's Blog 
And yet people continue to say that the amount of resources a school is given doesn’t matter.
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And yet people continue to say that the amount of resources a school is given doesn’t matter.
Indeed conservatives do say this. It makes it difficult for me to understand the idea of tolerance. Why is it not true that conservatism is evil, purely and simply?
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The story isn’t about money, though. It’s about segregation.
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Segregration is absolutely linked to money and resources. The idea was that it’s more difficult to defund/underfund schools with black students if white students go there as well. Of course, they try to create different schools within schools by funneling as many white or wealthy students into the “gifted” program as possible while funneling others into remedial ed, but at least the building passes inspection (wow I’m cynical today). A lot of gifted programs are just ways to funnel more resources to the “right” students and don’t actually address issues of high IQ or giftedness. For example, gifted students get smaller classes and field trips when pretty much everyone would benefit from both.
After reshaping the schools, the district funded four of them erratically. Some years they got less money per student than other schools, including those in more affluent parts of the county. In 2009, the year after resegregation, at least 50 elementary schools got more money per student than Campbell Park.
Beginning in the 1930s, city leaders drew up plans for a “colored zone” on the city’s south side and made it impossible, through permitting and housing discrimination, for blacks to live or own businesses outside its borders. Blacks who tried to move out of the zone were met with death threats.
In the 1970s, city and county leaders routed Interstate 275 through the heart of St. Petersburg’s black community. Whole blocks were razed and thousands of families were resettled farther south of Central Avenue, where the county’s most segregated schools stand today.
Hilariously, if you look at the map of St. Petersburg, that area has been gerrymandered into a different congressional district than the rest of the city. They’re on the same peninsula. The current Congress member would not have his seat otherwise.
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It is an enormous, tragic even mistake to believe that throwing money at the problem will cure segregation. Racism is not in the wallets. It’s in the heads.
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Yes, I understand. The term “neighborhood schools” has been a code word for segregated schools at least since the 1960’s.
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