Institutional Racism in America
with Examples
JENNA ROBERTS·SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 2019
If you have been paying even a little bit of attention, you have probably heard of the college entrance scandal, and how Felicity Huffman was sentenced to 14 days in prison for paying an SAT proctor $15,000 to inflate her child's scores.Immediately, we have seen comparisons between her case and that of Tonya McDowell, a homeless black woman who was convicted of “larceny” in 2012, for enrolling her child in “the wrong” school district. She was sentenced to 5 years for this conviction. Then there is the story of Kelley Williams-Bolar, a black mother who lied about her address to get her children into a better school district. Her children attended for four years. She was convicted of a felony for falsifying documents, and the district asked for $30K in tuition. This story is especially appalling when you find out that the district hired a private investigator to follow this mother. These stories made me curious, so I did a bit of Googling. I found this article that tells the story of a few other parents who faced criminal charges for similar crimes. But wait! That’s not the most outrageous part. These schools, who are so concerned that their students are being robbed of an education by these parents who have the audacity to want their children educated are spending money on private investigators and tip lines! “In Beverly Hills, Calif., where officials say they deal with at least one confirmed enrollment-fraud case a month, the school board last summer voted to enact a measure to impose fines of $150 a day or up to $14,000 a year on families who seek entry with forged leases or utility bills.
Boston public schools maintain an anonymous tip line for parents to expose students they suspect are lying about where they live. And the Bayonne school district, in northern New Jersey, promises parents a $200 bounty when they provide credible information that leads to a student being kicked out.”
Now let’s go back to Felicity Huffman. She bribed an official to inflate her daughter’s SAT scores so that her daughter could get into a better school. Some people are drawing comparisons between her case and the cases of some of these parents, who happen to be non-white people. Of course, in our political climate, when something is held up as an indicator of racism, there is another group to argue: it has nothing to do with race, it’s all about what representation one can afford.
Here’s my thoughts on that: ARE YOU EVEN PAYING ATTENTION? If it involves money, it automatically offers a disadvantage to single mothers and people of color. God help you if you’re a single mother of color!
But that’s not the real reason I’m writing this. While the fairness of the sentencing is certainly glaringly biased, it’s the disturbingly unbalanced policy of funding our school districts through local property taxes that has my blood boiling!
I’m not a legal expert, but I am pretty intelligent, or at least that’s what my mama tells me. It doesn’t seem like that far of a stretch to apply that ruling to school districts whose budget and resources are limited by tax revenue collected from local property owners. It is a system that perpetuates disadvantage. And, again, disproportionately limits the opportunities for success for children of color. This is the definition of institutionalized racism.
The problem with Brown vs. Board of Education was that it did not address how schools should be desegregated, so we had busing issues, among other disturbing things. I have a proposal suggestion for how to equalize schools. Public schools should all be allowed the same number of dollars per enrolled student. No more. No less. School districts should have to submit their budgets for approval and mandatory student/teacher ratios must be set. This will force additional funds into the classroom and not into additional administrators or flashy new district office buildings on Capitol Mall.
How could we fund this? Counties could be forced to spend a minimum percentage of their budgets on schools. If those budgets don’t cover the per student spending required by federal standards, the state will subsidize it. If the state can’t, the fed will.
Now, let me address some of the objections I can already hear:
“Those parents work hard to live in those neighborhoods. They pay higher taxes and their children should benefit from their hard work.”
I work(ed) hard, too, and, but I have no children. Do I get a refund? The fact is, parents in poor neighborhoods are likely working harder than anyone, but salaries in our society do not reflect the amount of work a person does. <deleted snarky political comment>
I know that one immediate response will be something about giving the government more power is a bad thing. But other than keeping our children healthy, what is a greater priority than educating them? I am not suggesting giving the government more power. I’m suggesting that we demand more from Federal Decision Makers who can afford private schools for their children due to salaries paid by the tax dollars of the poor and middle classes, because we all know that the wealthy have ways to avoid paying taxes. I don’t claim to know much about policy or law, but as a former teacher, I know quite a bit about the absurdity of school budgets. You can read about that here, if you like. The inequity is real and disturbing and it is undeniably biased against people of color.