Another Perspective on School Segregation

 In her brilliant Harvard Law Review article, Monopolizing Whiteness, Professor Erika Wilson highlights the process of social closure. This is how predominately white school districts are able to hoard resources which in turn produce higher quality schools and ultimately better prepared students. What studies have demonstrated is that students in white segregated schools do better than students in black or minority-segregated schools. The statistics also indicate that most white students in white segregated schools do better than their black classmates. As a result, until we make wholesale modifications to our education systems, it is important for black students to begin their educations in white segregated schools rather than enter them at some later point. However, the legacy of residential segregation indicates that most people of color spend a great deal of their social and economic capital breaking into these neighborhoods later in life as opposed to earlier and place their children at a disadvantage in these school systems. 

As such, parents of children of color have two financial burdens: 1) moving to better and more expensive neighborhoods where they will most likely be the minority, and 2) supplementing their children’s education once arriving to help them catch up and to equally buttress them from cultural damage that they will sustain being in a majority-white/white segregated school.
What Wilson describes creates a very strong legal argument that should be used in attacking school segregation in New Jersey. That is that white-student segregation “...impedes the democratic goals of public education and the overall health of the American democracy.” She further asserts the point that: “Public education is often tabbed as the great equalizer. It is supposed to provide a vehicle through which anyone can obtain social mobility and the skills necessary to participate effectively in the American democracy. When white students cluster together in public schools, it creates school-based economies of agglomeration.”

In New Jersey we see that this process occurs in two forms. Foremost, white parents dominate control of the public schools and the districting process. In many districts, public schools remain segregated from Pre-K to high school. However, in some of the more wealthier districts, where towns have witnessed changing racial demographics, neighborhood public schools are segregated, but the single town high school reveals community diversity. In these cases, rather than accept the consequences, white parents pull their children out of the public high school or create other alternatives. As a result, they willfully destroy the advantages that the white-segregated school system has provided largely because it no longer serves their greater needs. In some extreme cases, some white parents have run for elective school board positions to limit advantages that might help children of color succeed.

Professor Wilson also reveals that social closure can be seen in other forms besides segregated schools. Some common examples employed in New Jersey that might not be considered by taxpayers include things such as honors and AP classes which can be shut off to students of color, the use of technology within and outside of the classroom, the ability to take textbooks home, and funding for athletic endeavors. 

Hence, in many respects, New Jersey is different from other states in managing its segregated school systems. Factors like local and state funding of public schools, patterns of residential settlement, locations of various types of employment, and regional politics have degrees of impact that go far beyond personal prejudice. I've argued that the amount of funding given to a school district does not play a major role in the success of its students. This comment led to a firestorm of criticism however the statistics support my words. Aid in New Jersey is weighted so that it appears that everyone gets roughly the same amount on a per pupil basis. Therefore a child in Newark should have the same funding as a child in Summit. 

Unfortunately, in practice, fair and equal funding is more myth than reality. In truth, some legal experts and politicians would call BS on the concept of funding equality. To take it one step further, it is the way that the funding addresses the needs of the district that makes a difference. New Jersey has high need districts, Abbott Districts (specially court designated districts) and other districts which require different funding formulas. These districts may receive more funding, but yet students in these districts still do not perform as well as their counterparts in other districts. For example Essex County (37.5% black, 27.2% white & 24.3% Hispanic), which has the state's largest African American population and includes Newark, the state's largest city, receives over a billion dollars in equalization aid and many of its school districts struggle to meet state testing/performance standards  (https://www.nj.gov/education/stateaid/2021/FY21%20Revised%20County%20Summaries.pdf). Passaic (42.7% Hispanic, 38/8% white & 9.8% black), Hudson (40% Hispanic & 17% Asian) and Union (33.9% Hispanic & 19.5% black) counties also receive sizable equalization aid and also have several underperforming school districts. 

(https://www.state.nj.us/education/title1/archive/program/sigschools.pdf) These figures reveal that money does not create a good school. A deeper analysis would reveal that students in many of these districts are being cheated out of rich opportunities largely due to racism. 

Online community school scores tend to support the language of fearful realtors and parents who instantly point to race as the sole reason for school failure. A closer examination might suggest that many underperforming school districts are urbanized ones where there are greater degrees of poverty, more second language learners, more students with special needs, older facilities and greater security concerns. The statistical analysis for the best districts might foster the need for greater analysis. The top four school districts in New Jersey are Ridgewood (Bergen), Livingston (Essex), Millburn (Essex) and Westfield (Union). The ten highest ranking counties by school districts are Bergen (53.3%white), Somerset (51.3% white), Hunterdon (81.1% white), Middlesex (38.5% white), Mercer (43.5% white), Morris (66.9% white), Monmouth (71.5% white), Burlington (63.7% white), Union (36.7% white), and Sussex (81% white). Not all urbanized communities are underperforming, nor are the very richest towns home to the best schools. Within many underperforming districts there is at least one school that is exemplary, and counties with degrees of diversity have high performing schools. This clearly undercuts the belief that race alone warrants segregationist behaviors.

So, the data on school funding is purposely skewed and used by critics in ways to denounce certain municipalities and urge whites to avoid living in particular communities. Dollars spent does not equate to funds actually spent on classroom learning. A school district which needs to spend money on safety or repairing old buildings might appear to spend more per pupil than a district that has newer buildings. A district where the majority of the students are in poverty spends its resources differently than one where few or no students are in impoverished households. If all of the key factors are taken into consideration, wealthier districts often spend less per pupil than poorer ones. Where this formula is very deceptive is in the practice of using additional outside funding to aid schools. In many wealthier districts, community organizations, including the PTO, donate resources to the schools which actually changes the dollar amounts available to the district to support education. The result is that many wealthier districts spend more per pupil than is listed on state documents.

However, residents in wealthier communities may see higher taxes to support their schools because their communities lack businesses to bolster the town's income. Using property taxes to fund education affects choices in residential selection and conversely, higher property taxes work to maintain exclusionary communities. 

Creating county or regional schools could eliminate many of the state's school districts, easily lower high property taxes, reduce school funding and produce more and better educational opportunities for New Jersey's students. Implementing plans similar to what was designed for metropolitan and suburban Detroit or greater Boston schools in the 1970s offer potential remedies for integrated schools. As Myron Orfield has highlighted, several northern counties including Bergen, Essex, Passaic, Morris and Union offer numerous opportunities for the establishment of new school districts featuring regional middle schools and high schools. Various supporters of these realignments have urged the courts, legislators and the governor to consider the need to create an equal and just educational experience for all regardless of race, creed, gender, or color.

So what is New Jersey waiting for? A Vox study on the evolution of school segregation https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/7/27/16004084/school-segregation-evolution infers what many in New Jersey already know. The remedies to address school segregation are available and somewhat easy to implement. It only requires an audience that is willing to consider and fight for the possibilities.