Re: Epstein v. Strauss - Dranesville School Board
Date: March 09, 2011 10:43AM
Thomas More Wrote:
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>
> I've cited multiple schools not just Langley.
True, that you've arbitrarily cited different schools at different times. But, when push comes to shove, Langley is the only school as to which you've offered any specific suggestion as to how to change the demographics (i.e., by excluding one of the Great Falls schools from Langley's pyramid and including one of the Reston schools). It gets harder from there and you have nothing else to say.
>
> Why are you obsessed with Langley?
I'm not. I think one could argue in favor of changing Langley's boundaries for reasons that are not related to changing its racial profile, such as reducing the county's transportation costs, but that's about it.
>
> > So instead of six "white" schools, you think
> there
> > are eight. Why stop there?
>
> I wrote there were 6 other "white" schools besides
> Langley and some could include Chantilly.
As I've shown, your characterization of certain schools as "white" is arbitrary, since there are more schools that are majority-white and even more that are plurality-white. Of course, none of these schools is all-white. Perhaps we should just call them "too white for Thomas" and proceed from there.
>
> But if distracting by picking nits is the best you
> have to offer, my argument prevails.
What you call "picking nits" I view as "blowing holes" - your classifications are specious and arbitrary.
>
>
> Most cases do not required perfect reflection of
> locality wide percentages in each school in a
> district.
So what? There's no requirement that FCPS redistrict and you've pointed to no authority to require it to do so. If you think otherwise, you're mistaken.
>
> > How are you going to do that without busing
> students in every which direction?
>
> No one said anything about busing except to note
> that we busing to perpetuate segregation now.
What are you talking about? Langley again?
You apparently define "segregation" as attendance at any school where the demographics do not match the county average as a whole within some unspecified, deviation. Very few here would share that perception. People here come from all the country - and world - and see a degree of integration here far beyond what existed in their home towns or native countries. Many of the non-Whites would be among the most vocal opponents of what you propose.
>
> > The two other schools that are plurality
> Hispanic are Lee (31.1%) and Mount Vernon
> (32.9%).<
>
> > Mount Vernon is plurality Hispanic (33%), not
> plurality Black (31%).
>
> Those are not the numbers I have from FCPS.
My numbers come from the 9/30/10 "Report of Student Membership by Ethnicity, Race, and Gender" issued by FCPS. What's the basis for yours?
>
> > I guess stereotyping a school is OK as long as
> you're the one affixing the label.<
>
> You grossly misuse the term stereotyping. My
> description is neither fixed nor oversimplified
It certainly is, and I don't want someone like you deciding how schools (or, for that matter, students) in this county are classified for racial purposes.
>
> > The only schools with 60% or more "white"
> enrollments are Langley, Madison, Oakton and
> Woodson.<
>
> Again I have different numbers from FCPS
It seems that you either have outdated numbers or bootleg numbers that are inconsistent with the latest statistical information published on the FCPS web site. Either share the source of your numbers or concede yours are obsolete.
>
> > By next year, Oakton will be under 60% as
> well.<
>
> It will still be 15% more white than the County
> average.
So what?
> > There won't be any artificial boundaries of the
> type you propose imposed on FCPS.<
>
> The current boundaries are artificial. Why do you
> insist on defending the current boundaries?
Whether the current boundaries are good or bad, or could be made more rational, those you have in mind would be even worse.
>
> > It's been found to be a "unified" school system,
> which means (under controlling Supreme Court
> precedent) that it has no legal obligation to
> devise boundaries or enrollment plans that somehow
> would remedy past discrimination.<
>
> Cite?
April 1965 Department of Education Order.
>
> Under your theory, a school district is free to
> engage in new segregation or re-segregation with
> no remedy to the victims of that segregation.
> Nonsense.
No, what this means is that the race-based "solutions" you propose can't be justified as necessary to redress past discrimination. Instead, they would likely be deemed subject to strict scrutiny.
>
> > There is no status quo, dude. The demographic
> patterns in FCPS are evolving constantly, and FCPS
> is one of the most ethnically diverse school
> systems in the country.<
>
> With identifiably white, hispanic and
> African-American high school.
Bull shit. Most people go into the schools and see a bunch of kids - of considerable diversity - not an "identifiably white, hispanic or African-American high school."
>
> One distortion piled atop another doesn't save
> your untenable defense of a newly and obviously
> segregated school system.
There's no requirement that FCPS draw current boundaries to achieve a particular racial balance at every school.
How is the school system "newly segregated" - all the data would show most of these schools becoming progressively more diverse over time.
If you think the school demographics are so offensive, you ought to be advocating for different housing patterns, not devising absurb boundaries.
>
>
> Falls Church is 9 miles from Langley. Stuart is
> 8. If 17 miles is an ok bus ride, those distances
> should be acceptable. Forest Edge is closer to
> Langley than Forestville.
Why are you obsessed with Langley?
Anyway, your lame response only underscores the problem. You can't send kids from the area near Stuart to Langley without gerry-mandering the boundaries for Falls Church, Marshall, McLean as well. You only have ideas, but no concept at all as to how they'd be implemented in a manner that wouldn't require, for example, Hispanic kids who currently walk to Stuart to have long bus rides to Langley or McLean (I leave out Marshall, because its demographics are about as close to the county averages as any high school in the county, so you have to leave it alone, and Falls Church, which has almost as many Hispanic students as Stuart). You presume that's what kids who live in Culmore or their families want, but that's nuts.
>
> > White enrollment in Fairfax has plummeted from
> 1990 to 2010,<
>
> plummeted? Give us the exact number and not your
> editorializing.
The number of white students declined from 93,171 in 1990 to 76,507 in 2010, a period during which the total enrollment in FCPS increased by over 44,000. FCPS isn't going to try to accelerate that decline to make you happy.
>
> > while it has increased in both Arlington and
> Loudoun.
>
> Lets have the numbers.
Look it up yourself. It's readily available on the ACPS and LCPS sites.
>
> > but some of it clearly is, and those
> jurisdictions would serve as a safety valve for
> white and other families who aren't interested in
> having their kids serve as a pawn in someone
> else's demographic manipulations.<
>
> The present manipulations are acceptable to you
> and worth this effort in defending. Why?
As noted above, while there may be flaws with the current boundaries, what you propose would be far worse.
>
>
>
> You're confusing de facto with de jure. Many
> cities had a de jure unified system yet had
> identifiably white and non-white schools and were
> held to violate the Constitution.
You're confusing de jure with uniform. Please explain to me how a black student at Mount Vernon is attending a segregated, "black" school - de facto or de jure - when more than 2/3 of the students are not black, or how a Hispanic student at Annandale is attending a segregated "Hispanic" school when more than 2/3 of the students are not Hispanic.
>
> > No. But Seattle reflects the Supreme Court's
> current views, which is that Brown was about
> eliminating race-based distinctions . . .<
>
> So you think Seattle overturned Brown? Wishful
> thinking on your part.
It did not overturn Brown at all, nor is it my wish that the Supreme Court do so. Seattle interpreted Brown and applied its rationale to a different set of facts. In doing so, the plurality stated "racial balance is not to be achieved for its own sake" and that "the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race."
>
> Seattle does not support your position. It
> supports mine.
You wish. The court overturned race-based school assignment systems employed in Seattle and Louisville in that case. Justice Kennedy joined in that decision.
Nothing in the plurality decision or Kennedy's concurrence supports a position that the type of redistricting you propose for FCPS is required. Kennedy specifically noted his disdain for a school assignment plan that divided students into "white" and "non-white" buckets (close to what you'd do) and the illogic of assigning students to elementary schools, but not kindergarten, based on their race (yet you'd redistrict middle and high schools, but leave elementary schools alone).
At most, there is non-binding language in Kennedy's concurrence - in which the plurality did not join - that suggests that FCPS can do what it already does in its current boundary studies - "draw attendance zones with general recognition of the demographics of neighborhoods." What you propose would either (1) go beyond that, by elevating race above other considerations or (2) only change the demographics of a few schools at the margins.
Whatever the ambiguities are in the current law, what is reasonably clear to me is that the type of system you propose would not be supported by the majority of parents and would trigger court challenges, and that the certainty of litigation would dissuade FCPS from adopting it. Conversely, there is no precedent you've cited (apart from your earlier, vague references to "Brown and its progenty" that supports a conclusion that the current system in Fairfax (or Arlington, Loudoun or Montgomery Counties, for that matter) would be found unconstitutional.
>
> But keep defending the current artificial
> boundaries, Mozart, that separate white kids from
> other ethnic groups, rich kids from poor, native
> English speakers from those for whom English is a
> second language. You've made very clear the kind
> of society you'd prefer: Virginia circa 1950.
That's weak, and you know it.
I simply oppose your proposal, since I believe it would lead to "corrosive discourse, where race serves not as an element of our diverse heritage, but instead as a bargaining chip in the political process." By the way, those are Justice Kennedy's words.
Most here agree.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/09/2011 10:48AM by Mozart.