AP: 'No Child' Law Raises Segregation Fear

[brooklynite]

...snip...

(Betty) Sternberg is the state's education commissioner, and one of her jobs is to unite the two systems so Connecticut can move past its role as defendant in the nation's longest-running desegregation lawsuit. On paper, it wouldn't seem to be that difficult.

No one involved in the lawsuit disagrees with its contention that Connecticut hasn't always given its poor and minority students an education as good as it's given its rich and white students. No one thinks the gap between the two systems is a good thing. And no one wants the disparities to continue.

In the past, the main hurdle has been money. Bringing the inner-city schools up to par with the suburban schools will cost a lot. New schools have to be built, districts have to be paid for transferring students and special services have to be provided.

But now, Sternberg says, there's another hurdle: the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

"We've had a reluctance on the part of school districts to accept youngsters who come in with deficiencies because they're concerned that if they get enough of them ... they'll become labeled as failing schools," she says.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060419/ap_on_re_us/no_child_segregation_11

[Ecumenist]

1. Re-segregation is probably what they want to accomplish.

It's probably the real goal of this legislation.

[Bacchus39]

2. defacto re-segregation is already here

this isn't news.

[Ecumenist]

4. Sadly, you're right...Too right... eom

[YellowRubberDuckie]

5. And sadly, I heard Clarence Thomas was the one who instigated it.

No link...just what I heard in Racial and Cultural Minorities class in college.
Duckie

[retread]

6. The real goal is the eventual destruction of public education.

*

[noonwitch]

3. So, it's really no white child left behind?

There's got to be a Tim LaHaye/Jerry Jenkins joke in this somewhere.

[Walt Disney]

7. Kids should attend school in their own neighborhoods.

If that means less integration—so be it. Busing kids around town is a waste of time, a waste of money and in most cases, does absolutely nothing to further the education of the child.

On the other hand, resources should be afforded to neighborhoods that are underprovided. And one way to do that is end unnecessary and superfluous expenditures like busing.

Busing for the sole purpose of racial balance is surely one of the most nonsensical ideas ever conceived.