School Re-Districting

http://www.nj.com/essex/index.ssf/2018/05/south_orange_maplewood_127_million_school_improvem.html

So according to this plan, my kids who would otherwise have walked a block to school, now may be bussed across town?  Where is the logic in this and where in the otherwise overtaxed under-funded budged are we going to come up with this money?

Not news that kids in the district are bussed for integration  purposes. This began in September 1979 if my dates are correct (or maybe 1980?). It worked great for Marshall-Jefferson and has been expanded since. I left town several years go, and my children left the public school system years before that, but I would have been very happy to see that new plan described in the link put in place when we were part of the public system; one of the disturbing issues in the 1980s to my mind was that the children were re-segregated in middle school, and that one or perhaps two of the neighborhoods were conveniently(?) omitted from the overall plan. Sharing the responsibility for creating and maintaining a community that is integrated both ethnically socioeconomically, is a key part of Maplewood (and South Orange) life.

My mother can see Clinton School from her driveway.  Her address is zoned as Marshall/Jefferson.  Obviously any children there would qualify for busing to Jefferson, but not to Marshall since it is just less than a mile away (9/10ths of a mile if I'm not mistaken).  But having to cross both Irvington Ave and South Orange Ave, it is unrealistic for any child to walk that alone.  So instead of a two block walk to Clinton, or walking a block to a bus stop, they expect the parents to be one of the many clogging up traffic in front of Marshall at the drop off and pick up line. 

I understand that they redistrict on occasion in an attempt to balance out the racial demographics of the schools, but it creates a real hardship for parents.  A compromise would be to offer busing to students who a zoned for a school that is further away than the closest geographical school if they are not allowed to attend the closer school.  It would really help to alleviate the drop off and pick up lines.  If I'm not mistaken Millburn does something similar, and they have parents pay for the busing so it doesn't impact the budget too much.  Financial aid is offered to parents at certain income levels. 

grayhill2 said:
Not news that kids in the district are bussed for integration  purposes. This began in September 1979 if my dates are correct (or maybe 1980?). It worked great for Marshall-Jefferson and has been expanded since. I left town several years go, and my children left the public school system years before that, but I would have been very happy to see that new plan described in the link put in place when we were part of the public system; one of the disturbing issues in the 1980s to my mind was that the children were re-segregated in middle school, and that one or perhaps two of the neighborhoods were conveniently(?) omitted from the overall plan. Sharing the responsibility for creating and maintaining a community that is integrated both ethnically socioeconomically, is a key part of Maplewood (and South Orange) life.

 Re-segregated in middle school?  How so?  I thought that both middle schools were fairly balanced and that most of the differences at school levels were in the elementaries, no?

"Sharing the responsibility for creating and maintaining a community that is integrated both ethnically socioeconomically, is a key part of Maplewood (and South Orange) life."

What?  Every kid in town deserves access to a quality education and if there are issues with certain schools in the district (and I am not in a position to say there are), fix the schools.  Don't completely overturn the apple cart to do so.  

sac said:

 Re-segregated in middle school?  How so?  I thought that both middle schools were fairly balanced and that most of the differences at school levels were in the elementaries, no?

The balance was closer in 2016 than it was in 2011, but SOMS was getting whiter faster. From the Demographic and Facility Study, April 2017:

Like Brigadoon, this issue reappears every few years.   

I vividly recall attending a 1997 meeting of the BOE chaired by School Board President George Robinson who was attempting to interpret a map of a proposed plan to integrate the schools.  If I am remembering correctly, the map consisted of two striking features: each house was marked by the race of the school age occupants and there was a series of stripes stretching from South Mountain Reservation across to the east side of the two towns, each stripe representing an elementary school district.  Mr. Robinson seemed a bit perplexed as anxious parents assailed him with questions.   I felt bad for the man. His heart (and that of the BOE) may have been in the right place but this was no "slam dunk" for parents who had chosen to buy homes based on the proximity of certain schools and simply were resistant to having their children attending a different school on the opposite side of town.  The plan was doomed by the apparent lack of forethought given to the potential emotional and practical considerations.  Perhaps this time will be different.

is the redistricting for next year or future date? What about parents who signed up for aftercare at a specific school? 

Norman_Bates said:
Like Brigadoon, this issue reappears every few years.   
I vividly recall attending a 1997 meeting of the BOE chaired by School Board President George Robinson who was attempting to interpret a map of a proposed plan to integrate the schools.  If I am remembering correctly, the map consisted of two striking features: each house was marked by the race of the school age occupants and there was a series of stripes stretching from South Mountain Reservation across to the east side of the two towns, each stripe representing an elementary school district.  Mr. Robinson seemed a bit perplexed as anxious parents assailed him with questions.   I felt bad for the man. His heart (and that of the BOE) may have been in the right place but this was no "slam dunk" for parents who had chosen to buy homes based on the proximity of certain schools and simply were resistant to having their children attending a different school on the opposite side of town.  The plan was doomed by the apparent lack of forethought given to the potential emotional and practical considerations.  Perhaps this time will be different.

 I remember the stripe map.  Ralph Lieber was the Superintendent and unveiled that one.  It completely ignored traffic flow, streets, the fact that the railroad bisected the towns and allowed for only a few crossing points, etc.

The redistricting is not for next year.  Our facilities are in lousy shape, so the board is preparing a large bond request to repair and modernize everything.  Part of that plan is a rearranging of who goes where, but it will phase in after 2020.  This is still early in the process.

a bit off topic but can anyone explain why the total middle school enrollments are significantly lower than the combined high school enrollment. 

vermontgolfer said:
a bit off topic but can anyone explain why the total middle school enrollments are significantly lower than the combined high school enrollment. 

 Three grades vs four.

If you meant the question reversed, one thing may be departure to private high schools.

DannyArcher said:
"Sharing the responsibility for creating and maintaining a community that is integrated both ethnically socioeconomically, is a key part of Maplewood (and South Orange) life."
What?  Every kid in town deserves access to a quality education and if there are issues with certain schools in the district (and I am not in a position to say there are), fix the schools.  Don't completely overturn the apple cart to do so.  

 There aren't issues with certain schools. There are district wide issues with inequality and the achievement gap. No one school needs to be fixed. Will integrating the schools fix inequality and the achievement gap alone? No, but it's a start. We should not accept de-facto segregation in our schools. Plus, studies have shown that diverse schools and classrooms benefit all.

If it means kids have to attend a different school or be bused across town to achieve that, then I think it's worth it. I don't think many realize that there are already pockets of areas that are zoned for schools that are not the closest to them (besides the M/J pairing) in effort to desegregate schools. The burden was placed inequitably on the lower income and/or majority minority neighborhoods while the wealthier and/or whiter neighborhoods were spared. Where I live, we're closest to Clinton, yet we're zoned for Marshall and do not get a bus despite being almost 2 miles away. Whatever plan they put in place should equitably affect all.

vermontgolfer said:
a bit off topic but can anyone explain why the total middle school enrollments are significantly lower than the combined high school enrollment. 

 True, big discrepancy. 

In 2016, CHS (1,911) - ( MMS (762) + SOMS (805) )  = 344

elvis said:

vermontgolfer said:
a bit off topic but can anyone explain why the total middle school enrollments are significantly lower than the combined high school enrollment. 

 True, big discrepancy. 

In 2016, CHS (1,911) - ( MMS (762) + SOMS (805) )  = 344

MMS and SOMS are only three grades while CHS is four grades.  

CHS/4 = 478 per grade.

MMS + SOMS/3 = 522 per grade.

The lower number of students per grade in CHS is most likely due to kids going to private school. 

And/or due to:

• the trend of increasing student enrollment, which starts in the younger grades and moves up. 
• the option for students to drop out of high school

So if its not a problem with the schools, the argument is that if we simply mix the racial make up of the kids attending the schools everyone will just do better?  

There is data that supports this?

DannyArcher said:
So if its not a problem with the schools, the argument is that if we simply mix the racial make up of the kids attending the schools everyone will just do better?  

 No. 

Edited to add- not that simple.

The ACLU-NJ lawsuit that led to this didn't seem concerned with educational outcomes, at least not directly. It was all about disciplinary practices and demographics, including the demographics of the staff BTW. Having the racial demographics of every aspect of the school district the same across the board just seems like justice to some people. As a parent it seems mostly beside the point. 

Another thing, this thread started with people expressing concern about busing students. Maybe it was said in the meeting, but I haven't read anything about busing. There are people 3.5 miles, maybe more, from one or the other of these middle schools.

Over two miles gets bus service, by law.  Below that, it becomes a messy decision.  We currently provide buses for a variety of neighborhoods that are closer to schools, but have dangerous crossings.  A great deal of potential for increased costs, worse drop-off and/or fights about who gets courtesy bus service.  However, that doesn't make this plan wrong -- it just means we don't have the full cost/convenience accounting yet.

DannyArcher said:
So if its not a problem with the schools, the argument is that if we simply mix the racial make up of the kids attending the schools everyone will just do better?
There is data that supports this?

First stab at a Google search:

https://tcf.org/content/report/a-new-wave-of-school-integration/

A large body of research going back five decades finds that students perform better academically in racially and socioeconomically integrated schools than in segregated ones. Students in integrated schools have been shown to have stronger test scores and increased college attendance rates compared to similar peers in more segregated schools.15 In the words of one 2010 review of fifty-nine rigorous studies on the relationship between a school’s socioeconomic and racial makeup and student outcomes in math, the social science evidence on the academic benefits of diverse schools is “consistent and unambiguous.”16 Furthermore, research shows that students in racially diverse schools have improved critical thinking skills and reduced prejudice, and they are more likely to live in integrated neighborhoods and hold jobs in integrated workplaces later in life.17

15. Philip Tegeler, Roslyn Arlin Mickelson, and Martha Bottia, “What We Know about School Integration, College Attendance, and the Reduction of Poverty,” National Coalition on School Diversity, Issue Brief no. 4, October 2010, updated March 2011, http://www.school-diversity.org/pdf/DiversityResearchBriefNo4.pdf; Susan Eaton, “How the Racial and Socioeconomic Composition of Schools and Classrooms Contributes to Literacy, Behavioral Climate, Instructional Organization and High School Graduation Rates,” National Coalition on School Diversity, Issue Brief no 2, October 2010, updated March, 2011, http://www.school-diversity.org/pdf/DiversityResearchBriefNo2.pdf; and Susan Eaton, “School Racial and Economic Composition and Math and Science Achievement,” National Coalition on School Diversity, Issue Brief no. 1, October 2010, updated March 2011, http://www.school-diversity.org/pdf/DiversityResearchBriefNo1.pdf.

16. Roslyn Arlin Mickelson and Martha Bottia, “Integrated Education and Mathematics Outcomes: A Synthesis of Social Science Research,” North Carolina Law Review 87(2010): 1043.

17. Anthony Lising Antonio, et al., “Effects of Racial Diversity on Complex Thinking in College Students,” Psychological Science 15 (2004): 507–10; Brief of 553 Social Scientists as Amici Curiae in Support of Respondents, Parents Involved v. Seattle School District, No. 05-908, and Meredith v. Jefferson County, No. 05-915 (2006); Patricia Marin, “The Educational Possibility of Multi-Racial/Multi-Ethnic College Classrooms,” in Does Diversity Make a Difference? Three Research Studies on Diversity in College Classrooms, ed. American Council on Education & American Association of University Professors (Washington, D.C.: ACE & AAUP, 2000): 61–68, http://www.aaup.org/NR/rdonlyres/97003B7B-055F-4318-B14A-5336321FB742/0/DIVREP.PDF; Rebecca Bigler and L.S. Liben, “A Developmental Intergroup Theory of Social Stereotypes and Prejudices,” Advances in Child Development and Behavior 34 (2006): 67; Thomas F. Pettigrew and Linda R. Tropp, “A Meta-Analytic Test of Intergroup Contact Theory,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 90, no. 5 (2006): 751–83; Kristie J. R. Phillips, Robert J. Rodosky, Marco A. Muñoz, and Elisabeth S. Larsen, “Integrated Schools, Integrated Futures? A Case Study of School Desegregation in Jefferson County, Kentucky,” in From the Courtroom to the Classroom: The Shifting Landscape of School Desegregation, ed. Claire E. Smrekar and Ellen B. Goldring (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Education Press, 2009), pp. 239–70; and Elizabeth Stearns, “Long-Term Correlates of High School Racial Composition: Perpetuation Theory Reexamined,” Teachers College Record 112 (2010): 1654–78.

I accept the necessity of moving the 5th grade to the middle schools, but I think the idea of a 5-6th and then 7-8th middle school configuration is a big negative.

When students are in a school with grades of 500-550 for only two years, they are not going to be able to get to know the administrators, their guidance counselors, or the advisors of the clubs.  

The transportation costs to this can't be discounted either, especially when the district is already in a fiscal vise.  Based on how much it costs to maintain the M-J and Seth Boyden bussing, the bussing to MMS and SOMS would be at least $300k per year, but that would deny bussing to kids who might live 1-2 miles from each middle school and who would really benefit from a bus ride even if legally they aren't entitled to one.  

elvis said:
The ACLU-NJ lawsuit that led to this didn't seem concerned with educational outcomes, at least not directly. It was all about disciplinary practices and demographics, including the demographics of the staff BTW. Having the racial demographics of every aspect of the school district the same across the board just seems like justice to some people. As a parent it seems mostly beside the point. 

 Of course the lawsuit is, at its heart, about outcomes.  But you cannot legally make outcomes the requested remedy of a lawsuit.  You have to request things the district can do, in this case to make adjustments to some of the factors that cause the disparate outcomes.

Runner_Guy said:
I accept the necessity of moving the 5th grade to the middle schools, but I think the idea of a 5-6th and then 7-8th middle school configuration is a big negative.
When students are in a school with grades of 500-550 for only two years, they are not going to be able to get to know the administrators, their guidance counselors, or the advisors of the clubs.  
The transportation costs to this can't be discounted either, especially when the district is already in a fiscal vise.  Based on how much it costs to maintain the M-J and Seth Boyden bussing, the bussing to MMS and SOMS would be at least $300k per year, but that would deny bussing to kids who might live 1-2 miles from each middle school and who would really benefit from a bus ride even if legally they aren't entitled to one.  

 As I understand it, the 5-8 configuration was tried at the middle schools a while back and it was shown to be a disaster, hence the 5-6 and 7-8 configuration proposed now.  Others with more direct knowledge of the history can corroborate or correct this.

weirdbeard said:

Runner_Guy said:
I accept the necessity of moving the 5th grade to the middle schools, but I think the idea of a 5-6th and then 7-8th middle school configuration is a big negative.
When students are in a school with grades of 500-550 for only two years, they are not going to be able to get to know the administrators, their guidance counselors, or the advisors of the clubs.  
The transportation costs to this can't be discounted either, especially when the district is already in a fiscal vise.  Based on how much it costs to maintain the M-J and Seth Boyden bussing, the bussing to MMS and SOMS would be at least $300k per year, but that would deny bussing to kids who might live 1-2 miles from each middle school and who would really benefit from a bus ride even if legally they aren't entitled to one.  

 As I understand it, the 5-8 configuration was tried at the middle schools a while back and it was shown to be a disaster, hence the 5-6 and 7-8 configuration proposed now.  Others with more direct knowledge of the history can corroborate or correct this.

 My impression of the 5-8 configuration was that it was always intended to be a temporary situation to relieve a "bubble" at the time.  My kids were younger (older child was in second grade when the 5th grades came back to the elementaries) so we weren't directly affected.  I believe that the 5th graders were in their own wings of the respective middle schools so not really in frequent contact with the older students, but I'm not totally sure of how that actually played out.  Many parents (and likely some non-parents) were unhappy at the prospect of 5th graders being in the same school with 8th graders, but I know many families whose children were in that situation and I really don't remember hearing much negative feedback from their actual experiences with it.  Some of those children are now parents in our district, so they could probably provide insight, but they are much more likely to be on Facebook than MOL.

DannyArcher said:
So if its not a problem with the schools, the argument is that if we simply mix the racial make up of the kids attending the schools everyone will just do better?  

There is data that supports this?

 Absolutely!   Please refer to the research by Nikole Hannah-Jones!

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/10/11/magazine/11nikole.html

I also urge you to listen to This American Life segment interviewing NHJ on her research and journalistic work on this topic.

https://www.thisamericanlife.org/562/the-problem-we-all-live-with-part-one/prologue

1971-1988 the achievement gap decreased by half in 17 years when schools were integrated at the height of integration in our history of educating youth post Brown vs. BOE.

If anyone had the pleasure of hearing NHJ speak at SOMS earlier this year, you were no undoubtedly re-educated about segregation in our country.  I was!  Her most profound quote for me that evening was, and I hope I do not butcher it, "I object to private school education on the public's dime!".  I am firm believer and supporter of public education.  Basically she was referencing economically powerful families abilities to live in HIGHLY AFFLUENT areas, keeping their wealth and influence, solely within their school district.

Her solution, most controversial, but MOST INGENIOUS, is to collapse all SCHOOL DISTRICTS WITHIN THE STATE and reorganize the student body, reorganize the funding, so that all schools are balanced with EQUAL ACCESS to materials, EQUAL EXCEPTIONAL FACILITIES, EQUAL SUPPORTS, and MOST IMPORTANTLY FAIR AND EQUAL BALANCE OF STUDENTS based on their academics, ethnicity, ESL, IEP, 504's, socioeconomic.

THUS, it requires that those in power let go the notion of "neighborhood school".  If you think about it, the "neighborhood school" is now synonymous with property values.  This was not the original intention of PUBLIC SCHOOLING AND FUNDING.

I am happy to fully support busing within the district to FINALLY WALK THE TALK that this district is FINALLY committed to CLOSING THE ACHIEVEMENT GAP.  I am equally happy to collapse all of ESSEX COUNTY so all of our schools and students benefit.  Dubious I am, as NJ has the longest and most blemished record of segregation!

Compared with most school districts nationwide, our entire district is geographically not much larger than most "neighborhoods".  So busing (not bussing - look it up!!!) among our schools is really not such an onerous experience for our children. In fact, many of them look forward to it!  I know a lot of families whose children have ridden buses in this district (including my own children for several years) and really have heard very few complaints or concerns about that experience.  

Yes, busing costs money, but so does most everything else in this world and it is part of the cost of having a truly integrated and multicultural community in our schools.  I see a disturbingly large number of people who supposedly moved here "for the diversity" but don't seem to want their children to be required to participate in making it flourish.

NikoleHannah-Jones4President said:

1971-1988 the achievement gap decreased by half in 17 years when schools were integrated at the height of integration in our history of educating youth post Brown vs. BOE.

 Suppose separate but equal education actually had been equally resourced.  Would there have been a Brown vs. BOE case?  Would the achievement gap have been reduced in in the same period?