Lately I’ve heard a lot from traditional school districts that this coming year they are really going to work on the equity issue inside most, if not all, schools. School leaders realize black, brown, and poor kids are getting the short end of the stick and now they have decided they are going to do something about it. Along with how schools are going to fix “learning loss,” the “schools confronting inequity” story has saturated the educational news outlets for nearly a year.
I’ve got news for those school leaders from those traditional school districts. You can’t provide equity to black, brown, and poor kids because your system is inequitable to the core. It always has been, and it always will be.
Politics isn’t equitable. There are winners and losers in politics. School districts, small and large, are rife with politics and the inequitable decision making that comes with it. School budgets are approved by an elected school board. Each school board member has certain projects they want to see inside the budget. Board members promise to vote for each other’s pet projects contained within the budget, a sort of quid pro quo between elected officials. These types of decisions create a tainted budget, filled with inequity. The same inequities can be found within the school contract and business processes.
School curriculum is filled with inequities, especially when it comes to black, brown, and poor learners. Young learners are expected to conform to the approved state and district curriculum, even though their individual interests and passions are often not represented within that curriculum. Black, brown, and poor learners receive less attention regarding their interests and passions than their white peers.
What teacher a student receives is highly inequitable. Most black, brown, and poor learners are matched with younger and less experienced teachers. More effective teachers usually receive the more plumb assignments, whether they be advanced courses or more motivated students.
Testing is inequitable. Most states still have a requirement that a non-English speaking student must test in English within two years of enrollment, even though that non-English speaking student might need additional time to become proficient enough to test in English. Much of the content included in testing is skewed toward privileged whites and not black, brown, or poor learners.
What school kids get to attend is an inequitable process. Privileged whites figure out ways to get their kids into the best schools, whereas black, brown, and poor parents are relegated to attend low-performing neighborhood schools. Just recently, a school district started a lottery so that poor kids could have a chance to attend some of the best schools within that district. A lottery? So a young learner can attend a good school? How pathetic.
The privileged like their public schools (unless they have the money to attend an exclusive private,) and the influence they have inside them. Their kids get the best teachers, the most attention, and the greatest accolades. And the public school likes the privileged. The privileged usually vote, and school districts need those voters when it comes to approving budgets, building projects, and other important issues.
Public schools are inequitable, and there is no way to change that.
Because public schools are inherently inequitable, especially toward black, brown, and poor learners and their families, a new system must be created to offer young learners more equity when it comes to their future. The only real way to provide equity to all learners is to develop an individualized learning plan for each of them. The cost of each learning plan is totaled, and this amount becomes the budget requiring funding. As the individualized learning plan changes based on success or struggle, so does the budget for the learning cohort. In addition to an individualized learning plan, a learning coach, able to build relationships between themselves and their learners, is essential to providing an equitable basis for smarter and stronger learners.
When I worked inside a large, urban traditional school district, I was always struck by how much time was spent on the “business and politics of school,” instead of focusing on what was supposed to be our main thing – learning. What I came to realize is that many school districts choose to focus on their “business and politics,” instead of taking care of children and their learning, because it takes care of the adults inside the traditional system. That’s wrong. Therefore, a new system needs to be created, one that focuses on the learner and offers greater equity to all children and all families, especially to our black, brown, and poor friends.
Friday News Roundup tomorrow.
Til tomorrow. SVB
A Better Path to Learning 
Leave a comment