This below is one of the nicer email I received from constituents when my board was attempting to make boundary changes so we could improve school integration.
“Because of your changes, there is a very good possibility that he will have to move from a top 5% school to a bottom 5% school based on test scores.”
I understand that due to budget constraints something has to be changed but I feel through this process that the neighborhoods in the open area have been disregarded. We are facing the brunt of the changes yet a petition to use Lindale and Barton [a magnet school] as the community schools was wholly ignored. I can only assume that Barton was left untouched because of the high percentage of district staff children in attendance there, better to help your own than to worry about the outsiders.
[as I remember, the reason Barton survived is because it was a magnet and the most diverse of the few school white folks would see as acceptable]
But what really bothers me is the changes made under the guise of budget constraints are really an attempt to reintroduce desegregation. In your stated goals, desegregation is number 3 on the list and in many cases this is considered before budget issues. I realize that the intention of desegregation is compelling, I agree with giving equal opportunities to all students, but I don’t recall busing has been highly successful where it has been used, including [Minneapolis Public Schools, integration failed spectacularly].
Madison recently expanded its least diverse schools.