Gentrification and school integration… a LOT to unpack here. But this is heartbreaking: “they come in and you get treated as if you didn’t have any value before… That’s the sad reality with gentrification.”
And I hear it from parents every day… the idea that we have to “fix” the schools (and too often these statements are made before said parents have even stepped in the door. Bad school reputation/word-on-street? Ugly prisonesque facade? Or is this… something uglier?). Yes, many schools need stuff and many schools could benefit from parent involvement (of course there are real needs). But we need to dismantle this tendency to assume a school is crap simply bc other privileged kids don’t attend.
And we MUST LISTEN FIRST to what folks who have lived in that school community are saying. Those kafkaesque fences that look so icky might just be someone else’s sense of security (did you hear that? that was me getting smacked a bunch of years ago).
And then the I’ll-go-if-you story. I was guilty of that, too. And I am ashamed. We need to talk about all of this.
http://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/article/Creating-true-community-schools-remains-elusive-10888025.php
I wrestle with this all the time. Bed-Stuy Parents Committee — totally guilty of all this. Started without visiting the schools. Banded together to go. And yet…this was perhaps the most pragmatic solution. Or, put another way, what are the alternative solutions?
Also the “they come in and you get treated as if you didn’t have any value before” is VERY complex. SO: No one thinks the schools in Bed-Stuy are doing great. Prima facia, not doing great. If you ask people, they will say it’s because the parents don’t demand better. However, if a bunch of middle class parents start demanding better, there is trouble on all levels. And it is very difficult to band together with other parents who have been there longer because the structures and institutions are not in place. But if you demand that they get put in place, you are a demanding middle class parent coming from outside and saying that what exists is not good enough. Solutions? Ideas? We get a lot of “you need to connect with the parents who have been there longer” but not a lot of help/ideas on how to actually do that.
I mean… yes. All of this. So many thoughts.
First, I am going to take the easy way out and say that every school site/area is different; what worked for me might not for you. That being said, what helped me was to remember that this work is truly based in relationships — not only between “groups” but between individual people. MOSTLY between individual people. We started our little adventure like (it sounds) you are in a way: we came as a privileged faction. While it gave us a kind of power and courage, it also was intimidating (and, dare I say, totally off-putting?).
I would suggest maybe attending some school events if there are any…? Go to a PTA meeting and smile and listen. Go to a talent show or whatever and smile. Tell the principal that you’re happy to bag popcorn or stuff envelopes or whatever junk they might need done. Drop off muffins to the front office or Parent Center. If there is no parent booster, ask the principal if she/he can put you in touch with one of the active parents and ask THEM how you could help. Just showing up without demands or pleas (or the implicit ‘do what we want and you’ll be blessed with our children’ vibe that can precede you, fair or otherwise) goes a long way. And this is a LONG game, it’ll take awhile.
And it’s okay to make mistakes. And not everyone will be happy all the time (ha! like any relationship).
But also, and this is a tough one, it’s ok to just send your kid. Just, you know, go there. And once you’ve built relationships with teachers/staff/fellow parents who see that you have skin in this game, THEN you support. This one is hard for many of us. To just accept whatever the school offers, without freaking out and getting all organic-gardeny (like, um, I did) is a bit strange. If you send your kid to privilege-segregated school, then she gets all kinds of bitchen glossy stuff and (sometimes) a “better” academic education (but not always!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Okay, I am going to tangent here — many privilege-segregated schools have great teachers and many have teachers who simply don’t have to do too much because the kids are already “there”. I know a principal and teacher who both pulled their kids from “it” schools and put them in “poor” schools because the teachers in “poor” schools actually have to work harder. So, for whatever it’s worth, the fact remains that it is super super hard to make any judgements on teaching badassery from the outside. And what works for one kid won’t be the best for the next. And so on and so on.)
But the idea of just-showing-up is strangely radical these days. It somehow translates into “negligent parenting” or something. When, as you know, your kid is most likely going to be fine because he has YOU. You will have a greater impact in her life than the school will (conversely, for kids whose home lives are not easy, the school can do a great deal to support and lift up — or not). So as your friends at privilege-school wonder how you’re willing to let this crappy school squash your sweet baby’s love of learning and regale you with magical moments of their educational story, you might just be okay with knowing that you have prioritized integration over these other things. You know your kid will be fine anywhere (again, I’m speaking about the great majority of children, not every single individual child) but that growing up outside of the bubble is the piece you couldn’t provide on the weekends. I fear I am rambling here… So fraught!!!!!! So complicated!
My kids both went to a kind of shitty elementary. Their middle school is better but… We gave up a lot and I know that parents have wondered where in hell I put my brain. Yet, at the end of the day, I LIKE the 12 and 14 year olds I have. They are so aware. They might not have as many science facts in their back pocket but their test scores are great, they still love learning, their souls haven’t been destroyed, and their visceral understanding of the world is impressive. Yes of course, they’re also little middle school turdbuckets who are TOTALLY embarrassed of their parents… but that is just age-appropriate hilariousness.
I am going to make Anna post — she is in a similar boat I think and her school has a history of white privileged parents doing all kinds of advance-action and then bailing at the last minute for charter schools and never enrolling their kids. So for her, the show up and then pitch in is pretty important. Anna?
More needs to be said, for sure, about the prima facia point. The long and deep narrative about crappy public education precedes your little school. (I read a study recently wherein parents have negative views about public ed in general but overwhelming like their particular school… WTH is that?) And the mass of poor kids spilling out of the school doors at the end of the day probably *look* like the image of terrible education. So, yeah, there’s a good chance that classism/racism are at play into this story.
It’s super hard to be a integratING parent. My son’s road was way rockier (for me) than my daughter’s two years later. But I would do it all over again (differently, I made mistakes…).
Thoughts????
This is a very difficult but essential conversation. My kids will just be entering kindergarten, and in an unknown city (my husband is interviewing for jobs to start in the summer). What is our place as white families actively wanting to help desegregate and bring our resources into the community, the absence of which is the main problem with segregation, but not take over or deny the voices of those who were already there? Shaila I have no answers as I’m not even there yet, but I can see how hard it could be to walk that line. Let’s learn together!
What a beautiful and heartbreaking conversation. Fraught, obviously, as Courtney and others have mentioned. My daughter starts kinder in our neighborhood school in the fall which (as Courtney mentioned) is segregated and suffering from the unintended consequences of “school choice” — i.e., parents with access to power and influence and the ability to offer extra support to the school (which, let’s face it, is A (not THE) contributing factor to MOST (not ALL) academically, socially, and emotionally well-balanced and successful schools) — THOSE parents chose to attend nearby charter schools. When I met with the principal to offer my support as well as offer to act as a marketing agent for the school, helping organize tours and creating much needed PR so that priv parents could open their eyes and actually see the school as an option, I was met with distrust. Ironically, many of my friends chose to use this distrust against the school again– saying things like “well if she is going to discriminate against us just because we are (affluent, white, English-speaking, whatever) then I don’t want to send my kid there.” But, the truth is, school administrators aren’t robots. They have feelings too. And their jobs are hard enough without dealing with their own pride and hurt feelings. And, if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck and pulls out at the last minute for a charter like a duck… then…
So I have had to eat a lot of crow. Crow I didn’t cook. And I can’t get defensive. I have to let her tell me why tours are stupid and how white parents come in demanding that their kids are all in the same classroom together (YES THIS ACTUALLY HAPPENED SO HELP ME GOD) and I have to say yes, that sucks big time, and yes, we are hear to support you, and no, we aren’t trying to take over your school or tell you how to do your job. And it’s hard, because as a well informed, well educated mom who has researched the crap out of education in general, there are a lot of things I want for my kid… and I may not get that groovy stuff for her, at school, right away. And some of it, probably never. So, kinder may be tough in that way. I may have to meet parents, wherever they are, at pick up, at drop off, at school site councils and talent shows, and try to listen more, talk less (google translate is awesome if one of your issues is a language barrier). I may have to settle for less communication with my kid’s teacher than I am used to, for less warmth and sunshine at pick up and drop off. And there may be times when I really do think I am right about something, and I am in a position to fight for it, and I may have to back down. And the idea of that feels so counter-intuitive to my mammalian instincts to get absolutely everything I can for my child. Grizzly bears (just the animal that came to mind, no reference to DeVos) don’t make sure someone else cubs are fed. But we aren’t animals. We are Americans, dammit, and I believe that this is the only tool we have now to rewrite our cultural narrative on how race and class impact society, and create a cultural shift through our kids so they are raised knowing how to be empathetic, socially aware, citizens of democracy.