I would emphasize the "middle-class" aspect, Kimm. As of 2008 in
Philadelphia, who cares if your investment counselor or your first
violin is white, Black, Asian or of mixed blood?
Magnet schools should be about getting kids to college, for the most
part. Of course they should get middle-class kids to college; why should
middle-class parents fund a governmental product that can't perform this
elementary task? But they should also get working-class kids to college.
That's how public education works when it's working at its best. When a
school system has a good balance of pupils from all classes, all classes
are willing to fund it.
Inner-city education broke down when it lost its upper edge. The
question before us now is: how can we rebuild a healthy class balance,
as smoothly and as swiftly as possible, so our city can do what cities
have always done best: expose young people to the future?
-- Tony West
Magnet and deseg schools are about keeping white, middle class
families in the system. It’s gentrification of the school system, if
you will. Low-income students and students of color benefit (or at
least they did, that may be changing) because of extra-resources that
deseged schools are eligible for, but it’s all geared toward whites
and the middle class. Unless enrollment is 100% lottery-based, but I
don’t know how common that is.
FWIW,
Kimm
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