Governor Bev Purdue is right to object to the new trend in Carolina’s largest school districts; Neighborhood schools and the end of busing.
Raleigh, N.C. — As Wake County and other school districts across North Carolina shift away from busing students to achieve socio-economic diversity, Gov. Beverly Perdue and other officials fear the districts will become racially segregated.
“It’s the most troublesome thing I think that’s happened,” Perdue said of the push toward neighborhood schools from Goldsboro to Charlotte.
I think that she’s right, but for the wrong reasons. See, I don’t think that white kids learn better than non-white kids. Or that black kids learn less well than non-black kids. I think that kids that come from poor families learn less well than kids that come from wealthy families. In fact, excepting the Hallmark worthy story of the little school that could, the over whelming evidence suggests that academic success trends with income.
What it does not trend with is race.
No doubt the Governor is correct when she senses something wrong with the folks who are clamoring for neighborhood schools. These are the folks who have been able to manipulate the system, in a very subtle way, such that the schools they attend are the best of the best. But she has to be careful on how she debates those folks; race won’t get it done.