This is the first of a two-part article.
Summer hours continue. Daily Episcopalian will publish every other day this week.
By George Clifford
Scripture presumes that education consists of more than the three Rs and that sagacious instruction offers hope for building a future that is better than the present, e.g., Proverbs 22:6 reads, “Train children in the right way, and when old, they will not stray” (NRSV). One essential skill for children in our increasingly global society is learning to live as brothers and sisters with people who do not look, act, or think as they do.
The responsibility for educating children belongs to every Christian. Remember, “It takes a village to raise a child.” Regardless of how you feel about Hillary Clinton, who helped to popularize that saying, the basic concept is profoundly Christian. In the liturgy for Holy Baptism, the celebrant inquires of those present, “Will you who witness these vows do all in your power to support these persons in their life in Christ?” Educating children truly and rightly is every Christian’s responsibility.
Controversy over the policies used to assign students to schools currently roils the Wake County Public School System, the nation’s 18th largest system with more than 137,000 students. Since 2000, the Wake School Board has assigned students to schools to achieve the worth goal of socio-economic diversity, a proxy, for various legal reasons, for trying to ensure racial diversity in the public schools.
The current conflict has generated sufficient heat and animosity to attract national media attention. Battles over the public schools are a major front in the religious culture wars that in large measure contribute to the increasing polarization of U.S. society. The details of the Wake County controversy vividly illustrate this.
Wake County is approximately 70% Caucasian, 30% minorities. Socio-economic status in Wake County, as in most areas of the United States, roughly mirrors race. For example, the zip code for my suburban Raleigh parish is 85% Caucasian with an average 2009 household income of $85,600. An urban Raleigh zip code has an 87% minority population and an average 2009 household income of $28,600. Busing for diversity has achieved a substantial measure of socio-economic (and therefore racial) diversity in the public schools. Research suggests that the diversity policy has improved the standardized test scores of Wake County students, especially those from lower socio-economic strata.
The assignment policy has spawned a large number of critics with some valid grievances. Some children now spend over two hours per school day riding a bus to and from school. Wake County’s rapid population growth in conjunction with the current recession has led to frequent reassignment of students from one school to another and converting approximately one-third of its schools from a traditional nine-month calendar to a year-round calendar to accommodate more students in the same building without increasing class size. Those changes disrupt education and extracurricular participation, student friendships, parental involvement in schools, pre- and after-school care plans, and sometimes mean that children in the same family attend schools with different calendars.
Critics and grievances coalesced this summer in a hard-fought, highly emotional election that produced a new School Board majority, a majority opposed to busing for diversity. The new Board members quickly seized control and, among other actions, ended the policy of assigning students to schools to achieve socio-economic diversity. The NAACP and religious leaders, including the Rt. Rev. Michael Curry, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina, immediately responded with vociferous protests.
The Wake County School Board has yet to announce a new student assignment policy. One option, intriguing to both sides in the present dispute, would create about a dozen assignment zones. Parents in a zone could request that a child attend any school within the zone. Lotteries would select the students to attend any school for which the number of requests exceeds the number of available seats. Depending upon who one asks, the Board might or might not draw the zones to promote socio-economic diversity.
Good practical theology requires careful analysis, not only theologically but also sociologically and psychologically. Three dynamics are important. First, white flight remains an ugly, often ignored reality. In a county 70% Caucasian, the public school system is only 51.8% Caucasian. We Christians, the preponderant majority in Wake County, have failed in our moral responsibility to provide a quality, attractive public education for many children in Wake County.
The legacy of prior generations’ sins – slavery and segregation – too often manifest itself as socio-economic discrimination, thus perpetuating racial prejudices and exacerbating greed. Children born to poor and lower income parents generally have fewer and lower quality educational opportunities than do children born to affluent parents, as evident in the Wake County school system and the choices parents make to send their children to private schools or to home school their children. In biblical terms, this inequality afflicts the sin of earlier generations on this generation.
Second, the recently ended policy of assigning children to create socio-economic diversity only partially succeeded in achieving its broader goals. Although the policy seems to have improved standardized test scores, consistent anecdotal evidence suggests that the policy has broadly failed to nurture student friendships that bridge racial and socio-economic divides. Proximity by itself is insufficient to create relational diversity. Instead, the policy has had the unintended, tragic consequence of creating a backlash among lower and middle-class whites, as well as others, against policies designed to promote a healthy and vital diversity.
Third, school assignment policies by themselves are insufficient to bolster democracy, foster prosperity, and promote equal opportunity for all, goals profoundly consonant with the gospel’s vision of a just society. A half-century after the Supreme Court supposedly ended racially separate but equal schools, growing numbers of minorities believe themselves politically disenfranchised, without viable economic opportunity, and victims of racial and economic discrimination. In most parts of the United States, voting patterns, incarceration demographics, and employment statistics support that assessment.
The Rev. Dr. George Clifford, Diocese of North Carolina, ministered as a Navy chaplain for twenty-four years. He serves as priest in charge at the Church of the Nativity in Raleigh, is a visiting professor of ethics at the Naval Postgraduate School, and blogs at Ethical Musings /a>.