Apartheid Education and Segrenomics
By T. Ultican 4/7/2019
Noliwe Rooks new book Cutting School: Privatization, Segregation and the End of Public Education, her fourth, is a commanding account of the century’s long trend toward under-educating America’s Black and Brown children. Rooks is Director of American Studies at Cornell University where she is a Professor in Africana Studies and Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. The book is an illuminating peek inside the heart-breaking education experience of black and brown families.
Professor Noliwe Rooks
Well meaning white liberals are often blind to the true nature of the injustices they are inclined to fight. Here, a Black scholar elucidates the history of Black and Brown education in ways that edify. I grew up in rural Idaho and never met an African-American until I was 17 years-old. I saw public education through the lens of my almost all white school. Big cultural events in my home were school performances, high school sports and rodeos. The few Mexican kids in our school were popular so I thought that was solid evidence that we were not racists. It was beyond my scope of understanding how different the American experience was for children being brutalized by racism. This book helps create that needed understanding.
Martin Luther King and his non-violent fight against racism absolutely moved my soul. However, I did not have a clue about how deep, vicious and sustained racist ideology was. I saw Bo Connor as an ignorant aberration not a representative of a widely held view. Most of all, it was not believable to me that people would purposely work to ensure that Black children were not educated even if they did not want them in the same school with their own children. More unbelievable is that today Black and Brown children are as segregated as they were in the 1970’s and their schools are monetized.
This book also answers the question, “Why are Black and Brown communities so vulnerable to the billionaire funded destroy public education (DPE) movement?”
Segrenomics
Rooks introduction begins by quoting John F. Kennedy,
“Simple justice requires that public funds, to which all taxpayers of all races contribute, not be spent in any fashion which encourages, entrenches, subsidizes, or results in … discrimination.”
She tells us that to lift all children up requires racial and economic integration and encourages us to educate poor students with wealthy students; not falling for the separate but equal fallacy. Unfortunately, today, poor children experience a CONTINUE READING: Apartheid Education and Segrenomics | tultican
