Not a knock on your efforts at teaching in the public school system (especially because you happen to be in a district where there's "actual" diversity and all the attendant challenges), but Public Schooling is no more equitable than the parallel system of Private schools. Private schools in our area only thrive because we have high-income parents and middling performing public schools.
Take a look at the state-wide public school rankings and the reality of just HOW inequitable the public educational system becomes glaringly obvious: the richest and "whitest" districts are in a whole other galaxy compared to the more racially and economically diverse cities or towns. And even the middling districts are themselves in a whole different world than the very poorest. In fact, the strongest competition for students in Private schools actually comes not from other independent schools, but wealthy public school districts. This doesn't even take into account the multiplying effects of wealthy parents volunteering their time in their kids schools...
It's strange that we understand highways, utilities, and so much more are shared as a public good, but public education is essentially reserved as a family asset. And full-disclosure: our family did Private through 6th grade. But that doesn't mean I think it "should" be that way.
All true. To make matters even more unequal, private schools actively recruit the highest performing public school kids (Black and Hispanic in particular). What’s tough to parse is the (to me) natural inclination of a smart and high achieving cohort to want the best, most rigorous education available, on one hand; and on the other, the unfair tendency for that smart and high achieving population to wall itself and its privileges off from the rest through anti-meritocratic opportunity hoarding. The longer-term phenomena of educated regional enclaves and assortative mating only aggravate the difficulty.
Not a knock on your efforts at teaching in the public school system (especially because you happen to be in a district where there's "actual" diversity and all the attendant challenges), but Public Schooling is no more equitable than the parallel system of Private schools. Private schools in our area only thrive because we have high-income parents and middling performing public schools.
Take a look at the state-wide public school rankings and the reality of just HOW inequitable the public educational system becomes glaringly obvious: the richest and "whitest" districts are in a whole other galaxy compared to the more racially and economically diverse cities or towns. And even the middling districts are themselves in a whole different world than the very poorest. In fact, the strongest competition for students in Private schools actually comes not from other independent schools, but wealthy public school districts. This doesn't even take into account the multiplying effects of wealthy parents volunteering their time in their kids schools...
It's strange that we understand highways, utilities, and so much more are shared as a public good, but public education is essentially reserved as a family asset. And full-disclosure: our family did Private through 6th grade. But that doesn't mean I think it "should" be that way.
All true. To make matters even more unequal, private schools actively recruit the highest performing public school kids (Black and Hispanic in particular). What’s tough to parse is the (to me) natural inclination of a smart and high achieving cohort to want the best, most rigorous education available, on one hand; and on the other, the unfair tendency for that smart and high achieving population to wall itself and its privileges off from the rest through anti-meritocratic opportunity hoarding. The longer-term phenomena of educated regional enclaves and assortative mating only aggravate the difficulty.