Charter school leaders should talk more about racism

Charter school leaders should talk more about racism

Charter school leaders should talk more about racism
Praising charters for “doing more with less” ignores how racist systems have devalued black communities, starving kids in both traditional and charter schools of resources

"Charter schools can do more with less” is a common refrain of school choice advocates, who criticize traditional public schools for wasting money. The promise of greater efficiency has been an attractive argument for charters as states struggle to keep up with ever rising educational expenses. Many charter supporters go so far as to say poverty is a poor excuse for underachievement.

In fact, income and wealth consistently rank as the strongest predictors of academic success. But racism is the reason students in black neighborhoods don’t get the finances they need.

Racism creates systems that undervalue black schools, homes and lives, leading to fewer resources for the people who need every cent. If charter backers and other school reformers are really going to uplift black and brown students, they must recognize this and fight funding inequities created by that devaluation of black worth.

Our new research shows that homes in black neighborhoods are devalued, draining critical sources of revenue for school districts – property taxes. Jonathan Rothwell of Gallup, David Harshbarger of Brookings and I found in the average U.S. metropolitan area, homes in neighborhoods where black residents are 50 percent of the population are valued at roughly half the price as homes in neighborhoods with no black residents.

Some might assume that’s because black residents are concentrated in older or less desirable neighborhoods. Segregation and redlining, which deemed black neighborhoods too risky for banks to award loans they gave their white counterparts, certainly kept investments at bay, accelerating depreciation and social decline. But differences in home and neighborhood quality do not fully explain the lower prices of homes in black neighborhoods. Homes of similar quality in majority black neighborhoods with similar amenities are worth 23 percent less than neighborhoods where the black population is 1 percent or fewer. The difference equates to $48,000 per home on average, amounting to $156 billion in cumulative losses in majority black neighborhoods.

There is not a superintendent or school leader in either charter or CONTINUE READING: Charter school leaders should talk more about racism