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U.S. Secretary of Education John B. King, Jr. and professor Melissa Harris-Perry from Wake Forest University engage in a fireside chat to open "School Diversity in Action: Strategies for Increasing School Diversity and Fostering Equitable School Environments" on October 17th.
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School Diversity in Action
The "peer to peer learning" conference (co-sponsored by the National Coalition on School Diversity and The Century Foundation) brought together more than 20 school districts and regional programs working to make school integration work in their communities. Attendees had the opportunity to discuss integration strategies adopted in peer districts, learn about federal support for their efforts, and begin to create a national community of educators and administrators working toward more diverse, integrated schools.
NCSD
members participating included Lee Teitel, David Glaser, Mohammed Choudhury, and Erica Frankenberg. Special Thanks to David Hinojosa from IRDA, Elizabeth Olsson of the NAACP LDF, and John Brittain of the University of Distirct of Columbia David A. Clarke School of Law, who helped introduce and frame the two-day conference on behalf of NCSD.
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In early October
NPR's Audie Cornish sat down with U.S. Secretary of Education John King to discuss his school integration initiative, "Stronger Together." The proposed program, which first appeared as a
budget request
in February and in July was introduced by Sen. Murphy and Rep. Fudge
as the
Stronger Together School Diversity Act of 2016, has received growing
support from the civil rights community. When asked why he would spend his final months in office on such a difficult issue, King stated
"we will be a stronger country if our students have the opportunity to have diverse experiences in school."
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In the wake of
protests
and civil unrest that rocked the city in late September, Clint Smith
at The New Yorker dug into Charlotte's renewed struggle with school segregation, uncovering how quickly racialized housing patterns can unmake integrated schools once intentional diversity is abandoned.
Drawing from "Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow: School Desegregation and Resegregation in Charlotte," Smith points to a 1999 court order which ended mandatory busing for school diversity as the pivotal event that lead to the resegregation of C
harlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, which in turn drove renewed residential segregation and the ongoing development of a more physically, economically, and politically divided city.
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"When we operate as if the past is irrelevant, and propose ostensibly race-neutral policies in a deeply racialized world, we inevitably create social institutions that perpetuate that social stratification. The
school system in Charlotte did not resegregate by accident, just as police in Charlotte did not perceive Keith Lamont Scott as a danger by accident. The country we live in is one that we have built to be this way. The cities we live in were built this way. They were court-ordered. They were signed into law. We made these choices, and now we see the consequences."
by Clint Smith (published by The New Yorker)
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NCSD Issue Brief 7, by Erica Frankenberg, examines how the Obama Administration's "Stronger Together" proposal builds on lessons learned from the flawed Technical Assistance for Student Assignment Plans (TASAP) grant program, which aimed to increase student diversity but met with limited success. Some specific improvements in Stronger Together over TASAP noted by Frankenberg include increased grant awards to create sustainable programs, separate planning and implementation grants, and required community engagements. The brief also includes recommendations for the U.S. Department of Education to strengthen Stronger Together.
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- Professor Erica Frankenberg, Co-Director of the PSU Center for Education and Civil Rights, has published a new report titled "Segregation at an Early Age." The report draws on the Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC) set from 2013-14, analyzing 27,957 public schools that enrolled 1.43 million preschool students. While preschool enrollment has considerable racial diversity (more than 40% of children are white while 30% are Latino and nearly 20% are black), the report found that many preschool students do not experience this diversity. More than one-fifth of white students attend preschool programs that are almost entirely white, and the typical black or Hispanic preschool student attends a school where over half of the students are from his or her same race. Students who are English Learners are also less likely to attend preschools with native English speakers.
- ERASE Racism recently produced series of maps examining the prevalence of racial and socioeconomic segregation between the unusually high number of school districts in Long Island, NY. The maps provide a compelling visual comparison between the current, extremely segregated system of many small school districts and what Long Island schools would look like if they were consolidated by town.
- Magnet Schools of America has produced a new toolkit to help magnet schools and their partners engage with state and local decision makers around the implementation of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). The toolkit includes NCSD's recommendation on a key NCSD priority for ESSA implementation, the encouragement of state boards of education to include progress toward racial and socioeconomic integration in statewide accountability systems.
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Other New Research on School Diversity
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ERASE Racism, in Long Island, NY, is hiring for a Communications Campaign Coordinator to help them achieve their vision of a transformed Long Island, with integrated communities in which no other person's access to opportunity is limited by race or ethnicity.
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NAACP LDF has multiple openings for policy researchers and experts in its Washington, D.C. office, where new employees will have the opportunity to help LDF pursue the goal of transforming our nation's promise of racial equity and justice into reality for all Americans.
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Upcoming Events of Interest
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National Coalition on School Diversity
c/o Poverty and Race Research Action Council
Website: school-diversity.org
Email: school-diversity@prrac.org
Mailing Address: 1200 18th St. NW #200 Washington, DC 20036
Phone: 202-544-5066
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