Unequal Schooling?
Harlem Parents Split Over Proliferation of Charter Schools
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/02/nyregion/02harlem.html/partner/rssnyt/
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The unhappy reality is that NY, one of the bluest of the blue states, actually offers less equal opportunity for education than, say, Vermont where, under Dean as governor, the state equalized per pupil school funding by redirecting monies from the wealthier school districts to the poorer ones -- many a summer resident has discovered the increase in his/her local taxes thereby.
Needless to say NYC is a nightmare for parents hoping to educate their children. When ours were young we had the good fortune to have the Bank St. School which was a demonstration one for the Bank St. College of Education move into our neighborhood. But we then, with the Reagan era cut in federal funding for education, watched the tuitions move sky high and parents without considerable income be excluded from the school -- scholarships which we had did not pretend to match need. Now our privates in the Morningside Height area (Columbia) run at astronomical tuition rates -- higher than many a private college. Columbia offers a lottery for some non-Columbia families in its school designed to serve it faculty, but the bulk of persons living in this area are up against either murderous tuitions or not so great public schooling for their kids.
Even our public schools vary widely in their quality. In wealthy areas such as Riverdale in the Bronx, wealthy parents contribute private funding to their schools which makes the extras available while those in the valley suffer from over-crowding, under serviced resources less than a mile away. And such is repeated variously in other boros -- Manhattan, Brooklyn, etc. Our NYC dropout rate for those not finishing high school is astronomical. The per pupil funding is as little as 1/3 that of the nearby suburban schools -- which also steal away our best teachers with their better salaries and working conditions.
Multiplied across America education is incredibly uneven. Those who most need education to compensate for limited cultural backgrounds of their families are likely to get the worst. Equal opportunity in America? Forget it! We have a nation increasingly locking people into our skewed class structures of extreme wealth and struggling poverty. This is no democratic dream land. It is a corporatized educational nightmare for far too many who live here.
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"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy cited by Machiavelli)
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Ed Kent 718-951-5324 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EndingPoverty
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/StudentConcerns
http://BlogByEdKent.blogspot.com/
http://www.bloggernews.net
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/02/nyregion/02harlem.html/partner/rssnyt/
........................
The unhappy reality is that NY, one of the bluest of the blue states, actually offers less equal opportunity for education than, say, Vermont where, under Dean as governor, the state equalized per pupil school funding by redirecting monies from the wealthier school districts to the poorer ones -- many a summer resident has discovered the increase in his/her local taxes thereby.
Needless to say NYC is a nightmare for parents hoping to educate their children. When ours were young we had the good fortune to have the Bank St. School which was a demonstration one for the Bank St. College of Education move into our neighborhood. But we then, with the Reagan era cut in federal funding for education, watched the tuitions move sky high and parents without considerable income be excluded from the school -- scholarships which we had did not pretend to match need. Now our privates in the Morningside Height area (Columbia) run at astronomical tuition rates -- higher than many a private college. Columbia offers a lottery for some non-Columbia families in its school designed to serve it faculty, but the bulk of persons living in this area are up against either murderous tuitions or not so great public schooling for their kids.
Even our public schools vary widely in their quality. In wealthy areas such as Riverdale in the Bronx, wealthy parents contribute private funding to their schools which makes the extras available while those in the valley suffer from over-crowding, under serviced resources less than a mile away. And such is repeated variously in other boros -- Manhattan, Brooklyn, etc. Our NYC dropout rate for those not finishing high school is astronomical. The per pupil funding is as little as 1/3 that of the nearby suburban schools -- which also steal away our best teachers with their better salaries and working conditions.
Multiplied across America education is incredibly uneven. Those who most need education to compensate for limited cultural backgrounds of their families are likely to get the worst. Equal opportunity in America? Forget it! We have a nation increasingly locking people into our skewed class structures of extreme wealth and struggling poverty. This is no democratic dream land. It is a corporatized educational nightmare for far too many who live here.
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy cited by Machiavelli)
--
Ed Kent 718-951-5324 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EndingPoverty
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/StudentConcerns
http://BlogByEdKent.blogspot.com/
http://www.bloggernews.net
posted by Ed Kent at 8:17 AM
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