Literacy Rates of High School Graduates

[GaryK]

I’m not Ken, but I’m assuming they changed it so that Black students could be dispersed among all six of 2nd grade teachers, rather than just in two specific classes where they were grouped with other white students too.
As to the number of students, 2nd grade has 98, and 12 of those are black.

So if there were white students in the black classes they wouldn't be segregated, would they?

I guess that’s a matter of opinion. Technically, no they aren’t segregated because they’re with other white students. However, it meant that if a particular (Black) student would have been better served by having a particular teacher, but that teacher didn’t teach one of the ‘black’ classes, then that seems like the child is being put at a disadvantage because of his/her color.

I’m not sure segregation was the best term to be using. Because as has clearly happened in this thread, we associate certain things with that word. So we have this big debacle amongst ourselves, where I think we all feel the same about the situation once we are actually clear on what that situation is. But for the longest time, we are talking about two completely different things.

(All this other stuff aside: as someone who has fought more than once to make sure my child’s educational needs were being taken care of in a way that best suited them, I’m sympathetic to this mom’s plight. I just wish she would have framed it with better terminology, so we could discuss the actual issues, rather than having some stupid culture war over something that isn’t even happening.)

ATLANTA SCHOOL PRINCIPAL UNDER FIRE FOR RACIALLY SEGREGATING CLASSROOMS, PARENTS OUTRAGED

An Atlanta elementary school principal segregated its students based on race and one mom isn’t having it.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/atlanta ... lassrooms/

If the classrooms were racially segregated I can't see how they were mixed classrooms. According to this article there were 2 classrooms with different teachers for blacks and 6 classrooms with different teachers for whites. If they were indeed all different teachers, then there were a total of 8 classrooms. 2 for blacks and 6 for whites.

[GaryK]

You made the claim that there were all-black classes at this school. That is a claim that is unsupported by ANY of the news coverage and something that would be impossible because there simply aren't nearly enough black students at this school to even form all-black classes. So you are just completely wrong on this point.

As for the extent to which classes were organized around race? The initial claims of the first parent that they were, have been contradicted by multiple other parents who say otherwise and point to the school yearbooks as proof that she is wrong. Am I in possession of a school yearbook from this school? No. But I have no reason to question their statements.

As for CRT? Apparently you are unclear as to what CRT actually is. CRT is an analytical tool used by researchers when examining the impacts of laws on society. It is not some formula used to organize elementary school classrooms. So no, this has nothing to do with CRT.

Again, please explain what the school district corrected.

It appears that they reiterated district policy that students should not be assigned to classes by race. It is unclear to what extent that actually changed anything, because it is unclear whether it was actually happening as described in the complaint. This all happened last spring. The new school year starts soon. To the extent that anything changed or even needed to change is not clear from the reporting.

I expect from all the blow-up over this that they will now be FORCED to distribute students according to race rather than in some other race-blind random distribution that might result by chance in a class with a higher-than-average number of black students. If as a result of this national news coverage they now make sure that each of the 6 classes gets 2 black students, that is just as much of a racial-based distribution of students as having two classes with 6 each.

Are you still convinced, based on school yearbook photos, that this never even happened? You seem to have changed your tune from a bit earlier when you said this.

Your facts are simply wrong.

1. There were no "all black" classes at this school. there aren't nearly enough black students to even have all-black classes.

2. Many other parents both black and white have since come forward to say that the entire narrative is wrong and black students weren't being concentrated into just a few classes and that this fact is easy enough to verify by looking at the school yearbooks which show no concentrations of black students into single classes.

3. No, this incident has nothing to do with CRT. In fact the facts don't appear to even support the initial claim of segregated classes.

The mother protested the policy last year when she found out the school would be putting Black students into two different classrooms with two different teachers and white students into six classrooms with six different teachers.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/atlanta ... lassrooms/

Were the classrooms racially segregated? This article implies they were. What facts do you have to say this article is wrong?

[GaryK]

As for CRT? Apparently you are unclear as to what CRT actually is. CRT is an analytical tool used by researchers when examining the impacts of laws on society. It is not some formula used to organize elementary school classrooms. So no, this has nothing to do with CRT.

Despite your condescending tone throughout this discussion, it appears you are wrong that this stuff is not being used in school districts.

Shawnee Mission spent $400k on Deep Equity/CRT training

https://sentinelksmo.org/shawnee-missio ... -training/

And here is a link to what Deep Equity is. Sure sounds a lot like CRT to me.

https://us.corwin.com/en-us/nam/the-program-deep-equity

[Ken]

So if there were white students in the black classes they wouldn't be segregated, would they?

I guess that’s a matter of opinion. Technically, no they aren’t segregated because they’re with other white students. However, it meant that if a particular (Black) student would have been better served by having a particular teacher, but that teacher didn’t teach one of the ‘black’ classes, then that seems like the child is being put at a disadvantage because of his/her color.

I’m not sure segregation was the best term to be using. Because as has clearly happened in this thread, we associate certain things with that word. So we have this big debacle amongst ourselves, where I think we all feel the same about the situation once we are actually clear on what that situation is. But for the longest time, we are talking about two completely different things.

(All this other stuff aside: as someone who has fought more than once to make sure my child’s educational needs were being taken care of in a way that best suited them, I’m sympathetic to this mom’s plight. I just wish she would have framed it with better terminology, so we could discuss the actual issues, rather than having some stupid culture war over something that isn’t even happening.)

ATLANTA SCHOOL PRINCIPAL UNDER FIRE FOR RACIALLY SEGREGATING CLASSROOMS, PARENTS OUTRAGED

An Atlanta elementary school principal segregated its students based on race and one mom isn’t having it.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/atlanta ... lassrooms/

If the classrooms were racially segregated I can't see how they were mixed classrooms. According to this article there were 2 classrooms with different teachers for blacks and 6 classrooms with different teachers for whites. If they were indeed all different teachers, then there were a total of 8 classrooms. 2 for blacks and 6 for whites.

That reporter seems to have gotten some facts wrong or at least is inconsistent with other reports.

To reiterate. There were 98 total students in that grade of which 12 were black. They were divided up into 6 different classes (not 8) which generates a class size of 16 or 17 students per class. If the reporting and complaint by the parent is correct (and there is dispute about this) the principal was concentrating the 12 black students into two of the classrooms (or 6 per class) which would have resulted in the following class compositions

Classroom 1: 6 black students and 10 white students
Classroom 2: 6 black students and 10 white students
Classrooms 3-6: 16 white students each.

Whether this actually even happened is in dispute. But at worst it appears the principal was really trying to avoid the situation where one black student winds up in a class of all white students. She wasn't trying to create all-black classes. There wasn't remotely enough black students to even do that. Is it a reasonable objective to try to avoid having black students isolated into a class that is otherwise all-white?

Are there social or educational reasons for why you might not want to have black students forced to be a minority of 1 in an all-white class? And are there social or educational reasons for why it might help black students to be in a class with a couple of other black students? I don't really know but I don't think it is an entirely unreasonable notion that a black principal who grew up in Atlanta might think this.

If she was truly running a 100% race-blind classroom distribution then the luck of the draw might produce a result with all 12 black students in the same class, or a result where they are evenly distributed 2-per class, or anywhere in between.

It is a fact that EVERY principal or counselor looks at class composition and makes adjustments to "even things out" when they generate class lists. They want to avoid a class where say 16 students are boys and just 2 are girls. They want to avoid a situation where all the most labor-intensive learning disabled or disruptive students are clustered into a single class. And so forth. Or where all the really bright kids get grouped into a single class unless they are actually doing ability-based tracking which usually doesn't happen at the elementary level.

Should race have been one of the MANY criteria that this principal used to create equitable class distributions? It seems the answer is no. But whether she was actually doing that is disputed. We have the word of one parent who says it was happening. And a bunch of others who say it wasn't.

But no matter what you think about any of this, it is clear that there were no segregated 'black-only" classes. There weren't even any majority-black classes. Even in the narrative is true and black students were clustered into two classes, they still would have been in the minority in those classes.

[GaryK]

I guess that’s a matter of opinion. Technically, no they aren’t segregated because they’re with other white students. However, it meant that if a particular (Black) student would have been better served by having a particular teacher, but that teacher didn’t teach one of the ‘black’ classes, then that seems like the child is being put at a disadvantage because of his/her color.

I’m not sure segregation was the best term to be using. Because as has clearly happened in this thread, we associate certain things with that word. So we have this big debacle amongst ourselves, where I think we all feel the same about the situation once we are actually clear on what that situation is. But for the longest time, we are talking about two completely different things.

(All this other stuff aside: as someone who has fought more than once to make sure my child’s educational needs were being taken care of in a way that best suited them, I’m sympathetic to this mom’s plight. I just wish she would have framed it with better terminology, so we could discuss the actual issues, rather than having some stupid culture war over something that isn’t even happening.)

ATLANTA SCHOOL PRINCIPAL UNDER FIRE FOR RACIALLY SEGREGATING CLASSROOMS, PARENTS OUTRAGED

An Atlanta elementary school principal segregated its students based on race and one mom isn’t having it.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/atlanta ... lassrooms/

If the classrooms were racially segregated I can't see how they were mixed classrooms. According to this article there were 2 classrooms with different teachers for blacks and 6 classrooms with different teachers for whites. If they were indeed all different teachers, then there were a total of 8 classrooms. 2 for blacks and 6 for whites.

That reporter seems to have gotten some facts wrong or at least is inconsistent with other reports.

To reiterate. There were 98 total students in that grade of which 12 were black. They were divided up into 6 different classes (not 8) which generates a class size of 16 or 17 students per class. If the reporting and complaint by the parent is correct (and there is dispute about this) the principal was concentrating the 12 black students into two of the classrooms (or 6 per class) which would have resulted in the following class compositions

Classroom 1: 6 black students and 10 white students
Classroom 2: 6 black students and 10 white students
Classrooms 3-6: 16 white students each.

Whether this actually even happened is in dispute. But at worst it appears the principal was really trying to avoid the situation where one black student winds up in a class of all white students. She wasn't trying to create all-black classes. There wasn't remotely enough black students to even do that. Is it a reasonable objective to try to avoid having black students isolated into a class that is otherwise all-white?

Are there social or educational reasons for why you might not want to have black students forced to be a minority of 1 in an all-white class? And are there social or educational reasons for why it might help black students to be in a class with a couple of other black students? I don't really know but I don't think it is an entirely unreasonable notion that a black principal who grew up in Atlanta might think this.

If she was truly running a 100% race-blind classroom distribution then the luck of the draw might produce a result with all 12 black students in the same class, or a result where they are evenly distributed 2-per class, or anywhere in between.

It is a fact that EVERY principal or counselor looks at class composition and makes adjustments to "even things out" when they generate class lists. They want to avoid a class where say 16 students are boys and just 2 are girls. They want to avoid a situation where all the most labor-intensive learning disabled or disruptive students are clustered into a single class. And so forth. Or where all the really bright kids get grouped into a single class unless they are actually doing ability-based tracking which usually doesn't happen at the elementary level.

Should race have been one of the MANY criteria that this principal used to create equitable class distributions? It seems the answer is no. But whether she was actually doing that is disputed. We have the word of one parent who says it was happening. And a bunch of others who say it wasn't.

But no matter what you think about any of this, it is clear that there were no segregated 'black-only" classes. There weren't even any majority-black classes. Even in the narrative is true and black students were clustered into two classes, they still would have been in the minority in those classes.

Somehow, without you investigating this and relying only on news reports, you seem to think you know the facts better than this article's reporter. What reports have you seen that clearly state "that there were no segregated "black-only" classes"? Can you cite something other than your own thinking and mathematics on this?

Edited to add this from The Hill.

Kila Posey, who is Black, said she learned that Principal Sharyn Briscoe of Mary Lin Elementary School was separating the school's 12 Black second graders from their classmates last year.

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watc ... segregated

How can you have mixed classrooms if the school's 12 black second graders were separated from their classmates last year?

[Sliceitup]

https://www.blackenterprise.com/atlanta ... lassrooms/

If the classrooms were racially segregated I can't see how they were mixed classrooms. According to this article there were 2 classrooms with different teachers for blacks and 6 classrooms with different teachers for whites. If they were indeed all different teachers, then there were a total of 8 classrooms. 2 for blacks and 6 for whites.

That reporter seems to have gotten some facts wrong or at least is inconsistent with other reports.

To reiterate. There were 98 total students in that grade of which 12 were black. They were divided up into 6 different classes (not 8) which generates a class size of 16 or 17 students per class. If the reporting and complaint by the parent is correct (and there is dispute about this) the principal was concentrating the 12 black students into two of the classrooms (or 6 per class) which would have resulted in the following class compositions

Classroom 1: 6 black students and 10 white students
Classroom 2: 6 black students and 10 white students
Classrooms 3-6: 16 white students each.

Whether this actually even happened is in dispute. But at worst it appears the principal was really trying to avoid the situation where one black student winds up in a class of all white students. She wasn't trying to create all-black classes. There wasn't remotely enough black students to even do that. Is it a reasonable objective to try to avoid having black students isolated into a class that is otherwise all-white?

Are there social or educational reasons for why you might not want to have black students forced to be a minority of 1 in an all-white class? And are there social or educational reasons for why it might help black students to be in a class with a couple of other black students? I don't really know but I don't think it is an entirely unreasonable notion that a black principal who grew up in Atlanta might think this.

If she was truly running a 100% race-blind classroom distribution then the luck of the draw might produce a result with all 12 black students in the same class, or a result where they are evenly distributed 2-per class, or anywhere in between.

It is a fact that EVERY principal or counselor looks at class composition and makes adjustments to "even things out" when they generate class lists. They want to avoid a class where say 16 students are boys and just 2 are girls. They want to avoid a situation where all the most labor-intensive learning disabled or disruptive students are clustered into a single class. And so forth. Or where all the really bright kids get grouped into a single class unless they are actually doing ability-based tracking which usually doesn't happen at the elementary level.

Should race have been one of the MANY criteria that this principal used to create equitable class distributions? It seems the answer is no. But whether she was actually doing that is disputed. We have the word of one parent who says it was happening. And a bunch of others who say it wasn't.

But no matter what you think about any of this, it is clear that there were no segregated 'black-only" classes. There weren't even any majority-black classes. Even in the narrative is true and black students were clustered into two classes, they still would have been in the minority in those classes.

Somehow, without you investigating this and relying only on news reports, you seem to think you know the facts better than this article's reporter. What reports have you seen that clearly state "that there were no segregated "black-only" classes"? Can you cite something other than your own thinking and mathematics on this?

There are multiple reasons why Ken and I are both saying there were no black only classrooms. We’ve explained those reasons. But you have yet to explain it would make sense that the mother didn’t realize this was happening until she asked for a specific teacher. It would be clear to any idiot that the classes were segregated if they were black only. And only one of the news articles words it in a way that would mean it was an all black class.

[Ken]

Somehow, without you investigating this and relying only on news reports, you seem to think you know the facts better than this article's reporter. What reports have you seen that clearly state "that there were no segregated "black-only" classes"? Can you cite something other than your own thinking and mathematics on this?

Sure, the article that I previously cited upstream where the reporter actually investigated and interviewed more than one parent rather than simply taking the word of the parent who made the complaint last spring. I will re-post an excerpt from the article with the relevant parts emphasized since you missed them the first time: https://atlantaintownpaper.com/2021/08/ ... ry-school/

However, other Black parents at Mary Lin have refuted Posey’s claim of segregated classrooms.

“It did not happen,” parent Stacee White told Atlanta Intown. “My children were never separated into a ‘Black class.’ You can look at the yearbook and see that there are no all Black classes at Mary Lin.”

White said she was “bewildered” by Posey’s allegations, and was upset that a false narrative of segregation was being pushed to the media. White said she pulled her kids from a private school just so they could attend Mary Lin. She said her children have thrived at the school earning all As.

“I believe trying this case in the media causes harm to the students and the community,” White said. “It’s unfortunate and unfair.”

Parent Rian Smith agreed with White. “I’m in shock. The allegations that there are Black classes can simply be disproved by looking at a school yearbook,” Smith said. “It’s factually inaccurate.”

Smith said there might be an appearance of segregation simply by the fact that there is a small number of Black students at Mary Lin, but her children were never segregated based on their race.

According to data from the Georgia Department of Education, Mary Lin has 599 students in grades kindergarten through fifth, with 60 of those being Black. The second grade class has 98 students, 12 of whom are Black.

[GaryK]

That reporter seems to have gotten some facts wrong or at least is inconsistent with other reports.

To reiterate. There were 98 total students in that grade of which 12 were black. They were divided up into 6 different classes (not 8) which generates a class size of 16 or 17 students per class. If the reporting and complaint by the parent is correct (and there is dispute about this) the principal was concentrating the 12 black students into two of the classrooms (or 6 per class) which would have resulted in the following class compositions

Classroom 1: 6 black students and 10 white students
Classroom 2: 6 black students and 10 white students
Classrooms 3-6: 16 white students each.

Whether this actually even happened is in dispute. But at worst it appears the principal was really trying to avoid the situation where one black student winds up in a class of all white students. She wasn't trying to create all-black classes. There wasn't remotely enough black students to even do that. Is it a reasonable objective to try to avoid having black students isolated into a class that is otherwise all-white?

Are there social or educational reasons for why you might not want to have black students forced to be a minority of 1 in an all-white class? And are there social or educational reasons for why it might help black students to be in a class with a couple of other black students? I don't really know but I don't think it is an entirely unreasonable notion that a black principal who grew up in Atlanta might think this.

If she was truly running a 100% race-blind classroom distribution then the luck of the draw might produce a result with all 12 black students in the same class, or a result where they are evenly distributed 2-per class, or anywhere in between.

It is a fact that EVERY principal or counselor looks at class composition and makes adjustments to "even things out" when they generate class lists. They want to avoid a class where say 16 students are boys and just 2 are girls. They want to avoid a situation where all the most labor-intensive learning disabled or disruptive students are clustered into a single class. And so forth. Or where all the really bright kids get grouped into a single class unless they are actually doing ability-based tracking which usually doesn't happen at the elementary level.

Should race have been one of the MANY criteria that this principal used to create equitable class distributions? It seems the answer is no. But whether she was actually doing that is disputed. We have the word of one parent who says it was happening. And a bunch of others who say it wasn't.

But no matter what you think about any of this, it is clear that there were no segregated 'black-only" classes. There weren't even any majority-black classes. Even in the narrative is true and black students were clustered into two classes, they still would have been in the minority in those classes.

Somehow, without you investigating this and relying only on news reports, you seem to think you know the facts better than this article's reporter. What reports have you seen that clearly state "that there were no segregated "black-only" classes"? Can you cite something other than your own thinking and mathematics on this?

There are multiple reasons why Ken and I are both saying there were no black only classrooms. We’ve explained those reasons. But you have yet to explain it would make sense that the mother didn’t realize this was happening until she asked for a specific teacher. It would be clear to any idiot that the classes were segregated if they were black only. And only one of the news articles words it in a way that would mean it was an all black class.

I edited my previous post to include what The Hill published.

Kila Posey, who is Black, said she learned that Principal Sharyn Briscoe of Mary Lin Elementary School was separating the school's 12 Black second graders from their classmates last year.

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watc ... segregated

How can you have mixed classrooms if the school's 12 black second graders were separated from their classmates last year?

We may just have to agree to disagree.

[Ken]

Somehow, without you investigating this and relying only on news reports, you seem to think you know the facts better than this article's reporter. What reports have you seen that clearly state "that there were no segregated "black-only" classes"? Can you cite something other than your own thinking and mathematics on this?

There are multiple reasons why Ken and I are both saying there were no black only classrooms. We’ve explained those reasons. But you have yet to explain it would make sense that the mother didn’t realize this was happening until she asked for a specific teacher. It would be clear to any idiot that the classes were segregated if they were black only. And only one of the news articles words it in a way that would mean it was an all black class.

I edited my previous post to include what The Hill published.

Kila Posey, who is Black, said she learned that Principal Sharyn Briscoe of Mary Lin Elementary School was separating the school's 12 Black second graders from their classmates last year.

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watc ... segregated

How can you have mixed classrooms if the school's 12 black second graders were separated from their classmates last year?

We may just have to agree to disagree.

You are fixated on the wording chosen by one reporter who apparently only spoke to the woman making the complaint. Wording that is both inconsistent with other reporting on the incident, and doesn't appear to even mean what you say it means. If her claim is true, what she is actually claiming is that the 12 black students in the 2nd grade were being separated into two classes in which they were still the minority (with a majority of white students) but at least not the only black child in the class.

[Szdfan]

Szdfan wrote:

“Meanwhile, people in the community are asking whether we are teaching Critical Race Theory, which is a load of nonsense.”

Then you should be able to tell them “No, and we commit to you that we will not teach it.”

Do you plan to promote CRT ideas in your classroom like you do here on MennoNet?

Given your posting history here, perhaps parents have good reason to be concerned.

I don't let strangers on the Internet dictate to me what I teach in my classroom.