Debate on black-focused school in T.O. gets heated
16 Responses | Leave a Comment »
I haven’t read any of the arguments in-depth, but intuitively, I actually think it’s a good idea, as long as it’s voluntary, and it in effect gives black kids/ families an alternative choice.
As I see it, creating a black-focused school wouldn’t be like segregation for two reasons:
1) It would be entirely voluntary.
2) Society would be doing it self-consciously and self-critically as a means of addressing deficiencies in our current model of “multicultural” education. We would essentially be creating a specialized school which would cater to the specific needs of black students, which differ greatly from those of white, and East/South Asian origin.
Ultimately, there would probably be a stigma attached to attending one of these schools, but then we look at the trade-off: is going for the specialized support and guidance worth the damage the stigma might cause? I think it would be, if it can decrease the drop-out rate and create better peer and teacher-student relations; there are some predominantly black colleges in the U.S. which I believe work fairly well.
Also, as I understand it, there are some schools in Toronto (and probably Vancouver) which have become de facto Chinese, where they’ve had to implement special rules to force students to speak only English (and possibly French, but let’s be serious) on school grounds and during school hours to facilitate any significant language acquisition at all.
It’s not nearly a perfect analogy, of course, but one can see how if an ethnic-majority high school can develop “naturally,” then steering that development with special rules, procedures, and supports is not necessarily a bad thing.
Finally, the original reasons for segregation were entirely different and super-racist, so this new benevolent intent would colour
everything in a very different way (pun intended).
My position here is ultimately related to how I view ethnic social and political organizations: I see them as performing a therapeutic role for individuals and groups. I see them as a form of psycho-social intervention, something which can help people come to terms with their ethnic identities away from regular white-dominated or “multicultural” society.
This is why I feel it’s so important that leaders of such Asian organizations “rep Asian” in every aspect of their lives, or else they undermine the psycho-social health of some of their members and alienate them. They in effect choose whites/ other ethnicities over Asians while leading the very group which is supposed to be maximizing Asian representation/ inclusion and psycho-social health (for example, helping its members navigate through race-based identity crises without suppressing that part of themselves which cannot conform to majority norms). I plan to go into this further in a future piece.
From CTV Toronto.
A meeting to discuss a proposed black-focused school in Toronto got heated at times, with supporters saying the idea would curb dropout rates, while opponents argued it would segregate students.
One mother of four strongly against the concept was escorted out of the meeting at North Albion Collegiate on Thursday night after an outburst.
“We don’t have to go back to segregation,” she shouted. “Come up with something else. The kids are failing school, but come up with something else.”
The 100 or so parents and students who attended the session were divided into groups of eight to 10 to discuss the approach. It appeared most support the concept.
“I say ‘let’s try something new,’ because what’s happened before doesn’t work,” one speaker said, drawing loud applause.
According to Toronto District School Board figures, by age 16, more than half of black male teens at public schools haven’t earned the 16 credits required by the end of Grade 10, the Toronto Star reports.
Some parents say an “African-centred alternative school” with black teachers and role models is needed to help black youths graduate and succeed.
“The curriculum itself needs to address and look at areas that promote and teach our children about their culture and their history that has never been granted,” Tracy Cato, a mother of three, said at the meeting.
“This is Canada — they have to know different nationalities, but I think they should have a school geared for black kids,” said a woman named Tina.
Those opposed, however, say such a school is a large step backward.
“It’s been 50 years now since the end of segregation in the United States. We don’t want to go that way,” said Abdurahman Jibril, a father of three.
The school board’s proposal calls for an African-centred school from junior kindergarten to Grade 8 that would have more black teachers, mentors and a stronger focus on students’ heritage.
The school would teach the Ontario curriculum, but parents have asked that it emphasize leadership and prepare students for university, as well as have an “Africentric” focus, the Star reports.
Controversial idea debated before
Black-focused schools have long been a controversial issue in Ontario. When the idea was raised in Toronto two years ago, it caused an uproar.
Education Minister Kathleen Wynne said an African-centred school differs from the Conservative election pledge for publicly funded faith-based schools.
“That had nothing to do with student achievement. What the Toronto board is trying to do, to their credit, is find ways of helping students who are not achieving to achieve better, so I think they’re are two separate debates,” Wynne said.
Earlier this week, Premier Dalton McGuinty said he was “not personally comfortable” with the concept of a black-focused school.
“I think our share of responsibility, particularly in this magnificent diverse society that we enjoy, is to look for ways to bring people together,” he said.
Another public meeting is being held on Monday at 7 p.m. at Northview Heights Secondary School, at Finch Avenue and Bathurst Street.
School board staff are preparing a report on the feedback, which is expected to be released later this month.
With a report from CTV’s Naomi Parness
Leave a Comment »
Share
Entries (RSS)
timmyhos
1:47 am | Nov 12, 2007The school proposed is an elementary school, from kindergarten to grade 8. That is completely different than if they had proposed a high school that was ethnocentric. Most people develop into the person they’ll be for the rest of their lives during their late teen years, and it’s very important to prepare them for an ethnically diverse environment such as college and universities and, ultimately, the real world. Taking that away from them would be damaging.
They also said that the curriculum will be the same as public schools which is very eurocentric. Because they are also trying to focus on African heritage, I hope it’s not a case where they dilute both cultures. That would be a shame.
Xian
2:03 am | Nov 12, 2007If the article missing some information? From reading, I don’t see anything that refers to segregation…
Folks of the ethnic majority need non-Eurocentric schooling as much as anyone. I find it fascinating that whites would interpret majority African American teachers in a school as “exclusion” or “segregation”?
Sure, it looks like they wouldn’t dare send their kids to be taught by non-white teachers. But what does that have to do with anything except their own racism? And moreover, isn’t getting taught by people of a different ethnicity what the rest of us have to deal with in almost every class we’ve ever taken?
Then, not to reignite an old debate, but while I understand your POV on the issue and respect your position, I fail to believe that the psyche of Asian America would be improved through color coded dating, nor that there’s any point in us martyring ourselves over that dynamic.
We really aren’t that fragile–shit, we certainly aren’t as fragile as ethnic majority folks. Furthermore, how many of us spend all of our money within Asian American owned businesses?
It would seem that that’s a much more urgent, direct way of addressing the problem…
Dialectic
3:17 am | Nov 12, 2007If you go to the article link, you’ll see that it was a black parent worried about segregation. Some people are afraid that black-focused schools will essentially become segregated schools with all the old prejudices and biases coming back into play, a fear I understand. Overall, however, at this point I think it’d be worth a try.
Also, your final comments indicate that you don’t understand my POV. I’m saying that because these organizations constitute a form of psycho-social intervention, they ought to be treated as a psycho-social “safe zone,” one which offers some protection against the normal social pressures and dynamics of regular society. I’m not implying anyone’s fragile baby who could collapse at seeing a white person in their club, or that controlled ethnocentricity is some sort of cure for our social ills, but I am saying that since the group self-defines as an Asian group, it ought to actually stand for Asianness, which someone in an IR relationship does not do. Sacrificing the members who need this safe zone to help work through their identity issues for whites who are using their privilege to hang out with this group doesn’t look much like good Asian leadership to me. That’s all there is to it.
Dialectic
11:22 am | Nov 12, 2007th (for some reason your comment didn’t show up to me originally), if that’s the case, and they’re proposing a school for younger kids, I think I see why. The reasoning probably goes something like by the time these kids get to highschool, it’s already too late, certain behaviors, values, and levels of self-esteem have been ingrained, and if a kid’s going to drop out, there’s not much to do about it then.
I don’t see a significant problem with doing this for younger kids. While there will certainly be a culture shock upon hitting highschool, children are quite resilient physically and psychologically, and I think this would be the case here, particularly if their primary school/junior high actually succeeded and making them more comfortable with themselves, more confident in their academic ability, and more interested in academic merit.
To take another imperfect analogy, am I better off growing up for a while in China, or in redneck Texas? Am I better off growing up for a while in Africa, or in Alabama? Sure, neither is ideal, and you’d want these kids to be growing up in some sort of supportive multicultural liberal resource-rich environment, but if that’s not happening, then a “China school” or “Africa school” might be the next best alternative.
SamuraiJack
8:13 pm | Nov 12, 2007I wonder how much of a benefit it will be for black students - has it been proven to work in the United States? Also, I think it would be better to change the provincial curriculum rather than to create a special school - it would meet the needs of black students not located in that area.
Dialectic
8:30 pm | Nov 12, 2007Yeah, but the prob is with that is wholesale curriculum changes which benefit a minority of students are generally viewed as wasteful by the majority; it’s a similar situation to adding lots of Aboriginal content to school programs in Vancouver.
SamuraiJack
11:57 pm | Nov 12, 2007Actually, I was thinking of something more along the lines of the “gifted/enhanced/enriched” program already present, that would take students out of class once a week and tackle various issues with black students.
Dialectic
1:16 am | Nov 13, 2007I get what you’re saying. My instinctive response is that such a program wouldn’t be very effective; I infer from the extremity of the proposed solution that the problems of black students - lack of social and family supports, lack of role models, lower income, a culture that doesn’t emphasize education to nearly the extent of whites and east Asians - are so severe that simply adding some “black component” won’t work.
The gifted/ enriched model is different, in that it’s offering more opportunities to students who are already motivated and “gifted,” and it’s something of an intellectual/ academic bonus, where it wouldn’t take as much to improve motivation, challenge, and performance as it would for lower-performing students.
timmyhos
4:59 am | Nov 13, 2007It’s an easy concept to champion because as one black journalist alluded, and any self described liberal should agree, when nothing else seems to work they’ve got nothing to lose. And since it’s voluntary enrollment, parents who don’t want their kids to go can send them to regular schools. It’s just one extra option for the black community.
The only roadblock is to win the support of the general public since it’ll be government funded, which basically means that it’s the public tax dollars that are paying for the school. Privatizing it would be out of the question cause most of these families can’t afford it. In addition to funding, blacks will have to guard against the stereotype that they often need welfare and other subsidies to survive. This stereotype, while often untrue, is a common one when it comes to blacks.
Anyway I hope they find a good way to spin it so that the public doesn’t think that they’re paying to educate blacks. Tax is always a huge issue with Canadians so a government, in this case the Liberals, that fully supports a government funded school for a very specific population, especially one that isn’t overly popular, might have a hard time getting re-elected.
DONKEY
9:34 pm | Nov 13, 2007I don’t know what the situation is like in Toronto but I don’t see how this could hurt. If blacks are a minority then they are going to learn how to interact with other races anyways, even if they attend an all-black school. What is the black pop % in Toronto? I doubt it is high enough for insulating black kids from other races to be a concern.
If the black families up there were all against it, then nobody would enroll in the school and it would just flop anyways.
ZhaoGao
4:38 pm | Nov 14, 2007They’ll have a good basketball team, and an amazing track squad.
Dialectic
4:41 pm | Nov 14, 2007I take great comfort knowing our track careers were limited by our very genetic natures.
Senkeh
4:58 pm | Nov 16, 2007I don’t see how this could hurt either. When I went to school in Cameroon as a child, I got to study African history from African teachers, and upon returning to the U.S., I found that it did wonders for my self-esteem. I also noticed that I didn’t study African history here in America until I got to college. They skipped over it through elementary, junior high, and senior high school. All blacks are taught in America is the slave trade and Martin Luther King, Jr.–not very healthy, if you ask me. And Asians and Latinos aren’t taught a damn thing about themselves here (at least not in the schools I went to), despite the remarkable achievements and contributions of both peoples.
So I think all people of color in North America should have an option of attending a school where a Eurocentric curriculum isn’t taught. Our kids should be able to go to a place where most of our teachers look like they do and who tell them the self-esteem building parts of our history and who help them to preserve the better aspects of our myriad cultures. Think of how many blacks and Latinos would stay in school.
Of course, a byproduct would probably be a drastic reduction in anglophilia amongst people of color…and Lord knows we can’t have that…
Thaihorse
9:44 pm | Nov 20, 2007I agree with you that it is worth trying. A school alone won’t solve everything, but I think that schools that teach young people the truth about all of the contributions blacks have made to America and other parts of the world, that focus on discipline and achievment and won’t let young people give up on themselves can make a big difference. This also needs the support of the parents and the communities they live in.
So many of the young people I see here are lost and I’m not sure if we can save them. Our young people are our last, best hope. And black children that are able to grow up outside of the U.S. will likely have even more potential, if they receive the right foundation at the start.
One of the reasons people get lost is because they are surrounded by and bombarded by negative images and messages about themselves. If you hear a lie long enough and never challenge it, it becomes your truth. There is so much about this country that is toxic to our young people, if I had children, i don’t think I’d raise them here if I had other options. They need to see that there is so much more out there and they need to get away from the “message” that they can’t compete, that they aren’t good enough. So many of the generations before have heard this message that a number of us have bought into it and we are passing it on to our children. This had got to stop and if a special school with a special curriculum can help then I hope that they try it.
RebelAzn
7:21 pm | Dec 19, 2007I don’t think this is such a bad idea. The ultimate solution is to get our schools to teach all AMERICANS about their history, not just with a eurocentric focus. I know when I went to school I learned nothing about Chinese Americans. I learned only after I went to college and did a lot of reading on my own.
Most Chinese parents I know in CA send their kids to Chinese schools on Saturdays. I don’t see what’s the problem if other ethnicities did the same. American public schools are not designed to teach minority kids in most cases. Learning history of all the people can only help a kid’s self esteem. If all you learn is slavery and negative stuff, it will only damage the kid in the long run.
TheMac
9:34 pm | Mar 18, 2008There are about 100 historically black colleges, many of them having been founded by blacks during Reconstruction. There were all-black elementary schools (sometimes because going to other schools wasn’t a choice) until the end of legalized segregation. Even now, Yeshivas/Midrashas, Greek schools, Chinese schools…
If most of the parents want it, I don’t get the big deal.