"That's one in two black kids, 1 in 25 white kid"

"This is not a race issue. This is a commitment to education issue."

This week assignment was tough. First time I sat in front of this computer and I wasn't sure what to say or what to share. I still can hear the voice of the parents from Francis Howell. All the non sense comments and the cheers and yelling from the other parents. It brought me back to the President saying "get that son of a bitch off the field now. Out. He is fired", and the sound of the people cheering for his wise comment. Why both of these cheering are so similar for me? No no, its not about race. It is about respect for the flag. "Its about commitment to education issue".  

To avoid to talk about the sadness and disgrace this type of attitude brings to my soul, I choose to talk about the information, and again, the mind blowing that our assignments bring to my life. In this podcast, in more specific, it gave me a clear information of what I was wondering. Is integration a good thing? Does everybody just need an opportunity? Is this a race thing? "Of course, there are poor white children in the St. Louis area, but they live in mostly middle class areas, so they aren't attending schools as terrible as Normandy's. In St. Louis, poor white children are twice as likely to go to good schools than black children of all incomes. But race barely comes up that night, except when white parents insist it is not the issue." 

I still remember having the thoughts like "but they chose to be like this, they could be different" when I was thinking about the kids in Brazilian favelas getting in the drugs traffic by age 9-10. I once thought that integration could also be risky to a stable establishment. Of course I had never actually overthink these things, I was in a privilege spot and it wasn't part of reality. That is probably why I am struggling so much to write the blog this week (where are guys blog then I could make my blog about your blog?!?!), because I can relate myself at all to this podcast. Still, I feel this anger and sadness that took over my Monday... and for some people thats they daily basis struggle. I quote this again, "people of color know all too well that society racializes them with race other than White. Yes, white often do not think about race or racial justice, except when they notice people of color" (Armstrong &Wildman). 

I had to do some extra reading to understand this whole integration and desegregation. In Brazil, education is very simple to understand. Public education suck pretty much in the whole country. If you need a good education you will have to pay a private school. However, the best Universities are public. So, people pay crazy amount of money during middle school and high school, to make sure this schools prepare them to pass the test to get in a Public school. It is extremely competitive, and although public university schools has "integration" numbers of spots for black people, majority of the time the only black people are to get this spots are wealthy black families. Leaving families in low income almost zero chance to pursue graduate diploma. The fact that race is so mix in Brazil, I would say the biggest segregation is financially. Therefore, I struggle to understand how can a school be public and still be segregated. Or how can only the mainly white public schools gets the best teachers? Does the ones considered "good teachers" are unable to do a good job in mainly black public schools because they are probably white and can't relate themselves to their students? Why is bad keep getting bad and good keep getting good? "I think it's important to point out that it is not that something magical happens when black kids sit in a classroom next to white kids. It's not that suddenly a switch turns on and they get intelligence or wanting the desire to learn when they're with white kids. What integration does is it gets black kids in the same facilities as white kids, and therefore it gets them access to the same things that those kids get-- quality teachers and quality instruction".

"The US Department of Education put out data in 2014 showing that black and Latino kids in segregated schools have the least qualified teachers, the least experienced teachers. They also get the worst course offerings, the least access to AP and upper level courses, the worst facilities.

The other thing about most segregated black schools, Nikole says, is that they have high concentrations of children who grew up in poverty. Those kids have greater educational needs. They're more stressed out. They have a bunch of disadvantages. And when you put a lot of kids like that together in one classroom, studies show, it doesn't go well".

This part of the reading finally gave me some sense of integration. What I keep taking from all the readings is people need opportunities to be great. Some people get to many of them, other people believe because they were born white they SHOULD and deserve to have a bunch of opportunities, adolescents do not receive enough of them, black people minority not only they do not receive opportunities but when there is one they are not prepare to take advantage and arise. . 

After reading a little bit more about diversity  integration and desegregation  I found this article of "How Racially Diverse School and Classrooms can benefit all students". Its huge and I did not read the whole thing, but it talks a lot about the beneficials and students having a diverse environment, and how parents are reacting to this reality. According to this article "A plurality of American did recognize that attending diverse school is better for students. Yet a solid majority said it is more important to have students of to local community schools even if it means most students are of the same race". 

Then I go back to Nicole Hannah Jones observation "In the St. Louis area, nearly one in two black children attend schools in districts that performed so poorly the state has stripped them of full accreditation. Only 1 in 25 white children are in a district like that. That's one in two black kids, 1 in 25 white kids". What is the solution of this integration if not long ride in buses to different community?