"Divided We Fall" by R. Darryl Foxworth

When maneuvering through Baltimore you often feel as though you’re traveling between two worlds. One world sparks tourists to compliment the city’s beauty. The other world provides the empirical evidence behind the city’s sixth-place finishes in national rankings of the country’s poorest and most dangerous cities. In this world you find working families, mostly black, desperately trying to make ends meet despite the incredible forces working against them. You find an unrelenting drug trade, havens for homicide, extreme poverty, and nihilism exacerbated by unemployment and a public school system in disarray. That the city resides in the third-wealthiest state in the country might feel contradictory, if not for that pesky word we try in earnest to avoid: inequality.

If you're interested to read the full article, please click here.

Dr. Walter A. Gill on Segregation in BCPS

"I believe segregation in Baltimore is a built-in type of discrimination based on students who do well on tests and students who don't AND segregation which is a reflection of the economic conditions/status of the various neighborhoods.

An example are the four prestigious schools (City, Poly, Western and the School of the Arts), which have a high success rate of sending students to 4-year universities and colleges; and the other schools which have a high dropout rate.

Solution: Schools must provide a curriculum whereby students can succeed, that is have a career or profession, without attending a 4-year college or university. Many of the students from "poor" homes and neighborhoods could succeed if their skills, interest and talents were developed via alternative curriculums. Schools must advocate for students (what is best for each individual student) and compete less among them self (testing, reaching "benchmarks," for federal, state and city dollars)."

If you have the opportunity to check out Dr. Gill's book, we highly recommend it!
Teaching in Urban America: A Formula for Change

Help us save URBAN AMERICA!

A few facts about Dr. Gill, which are stated in the back of his book...

1. He was born in the slave state of Mississippi, Greenville in 1937.
2. Dr. Gill was raised in Baltimore, Maryland.
3. He attended six public schools; five of the six were schools in Baltimore.
4. Gill was the first African American to graduate from Baltimore City College in 1955.
5. He received a B.A. in art from Morgan State College and later received a Masters and Ph.D in Educational Communications from Syracuse University.
6. Dr. Walter A. Gill is a teacher, artist, author, actor and former university professor.

Dr. Walter A. Gill has made an amazing impact on students and has touched our lives as students at Towson University.

To follow more on Dr. Gill you can contact him
by email at urbanprofessor@aol.com
or through his website if you click here.

BCPS alumni, staff and students:

Collectively, we were influenced by the true story of Erin Gruell and the students of Freedom Writers (and the Freedom Writers Diary) to start somewhere. The impact of one patient and encouraging woman changed a world of ideas and solutions for many students.

We are highly interested to hear your stories and influences, opinions and thoughts.

Do you believe segregation is evident, inevitable, and/or present in Baltimore City Public Schools?
How has possible segregation or the desegregation process effected your life? Your studies? Your future? Yourself?

We want to hear from you!!!

"Dire Education" By Michael Corbin

"When you walk into a classroom of almost any Baltimore City public school this fall you immediately face the facts of 21st-century educational apartheid. The white children are absent. They left a while ago and won’t be coming back.

Standing in these classrooms you might think that you stumbled upon some remnant of white supremacy, some exemplar of American democratic, public institutions before 1954. What is striking is not the fact of segregation in America, but rather that we no longer care that segregation in public education matters to our democracy. In Baltimore, for instance, the generations-long struggle to integrate public education no longer has a place in public discourse. We complain mightily about the school system’s many woes, but we no longer remark that going to the city’s dysfunctional schools is almost exclusively a black thing.

“Why Segregation Matters: Poverty and Educational Inequality,” a 2002 report (reaffirmed in 2005) from Harvard University’s Civil Rights Project, ranked Baltimore City schools No. 1 in “black isolation.” That is, it found that students who attend Baltimore City schools have the “lowest exposure to whites” in the 239 school districts in the U.S. with a total enrollment greater than 25,000. The white children who still attend a Baltimore City public school are huddled in a diminishing number of schools and are often isolated within specific classrooms in those particular schools."

If you're interested in reading further, click here.

History of Desegregation

In 1954, Brown v. Board of Education declared segregation in education unconstitutional. The schools of the city of Baltimore enforced this immediately after the Supreme Court decision.

However, due to the location of the state of Maryland being below the Mason Dixon line but considered a Northern state, the population of African Americans in Baltimore was exceedingly high even prior to 1954.

In result of the movement, the numbers of African Americans rose and the schools became over crowded. This overpopulation called for structured districting amongst the school system. Meaning students could not enroll at a school in a district where they do not reside. The problem with the districts is the already segregated neighborhoods. Caucasians and African Americans lived in different neighborhoods therefore went to different schools.

There is recorded history of accusations that the Baltimore City School System is “race conscious” in their districting decisions.

Questions to Consider:

1. How should the city of Baltimore have handled the segregation problem post Brown v. Board?
2. May the immediacy of their enforcing been the downfall of today's issue?
3. Do you consider Baltimore City segregated? Do you consider Baltimore City Public schools segregated?
4. Do you think re-districting the neighborhoods of Baltimore City will prove a positive effect on the social issues amongst the races?

BCPS Improvement of Segregation

Great improvement takes time.

With the help from growing organizations and open-minds, Baltimore City has been attempting to surpass this societal issue brought into their schools.

A recent organization, New Leaders for New Schools, partnered up with Baltimore City and Prince Georges County Public schools to "recruit, train and support" future administration and teachers. Throughout this program since 2005, leaders have displayed high level achievement in comparison to previous years.

To learn more, check out: NLNS.org
Also, presented by BCPS:
Meeting the Challenges of Baltimore City Public Education, 1925-1956

"Without contraries is no progression. Attraction and repulsion, reason and energy, love and hate, are necessary to human existence." - William Blake

Statistics

To get an idea of the overall percentages of ethnicity (within schools) in the Baltimore city area:

• This District contains 89% black students, 8% white students, 2% Hispanic students, and less than 1% Asian students. The state average is 38% black students, 48% white students, 8% Hispanic students, and 5% Asian students. (from greatschools.net)

Schooldigger.com identifed 84,515 students and 200 schools in the Baltimore City district. 16% of those students have disabilties while 2% are english learners. Baltimore City Public Schools has a 90% attendence rate while the state average is 94%.

Schoolmatters.com explores each elementary school and its many statistics. We took a good look at the schoolwide reading proficiency, the schoolwide math proficiency, the enrollment, the percentage of the students who come from families who are "economically disadvantaged," and the school's ethnicity divisions.

Three out of four of these schools (all elementary) are within Baltimore city. Wood Acres Elementary is in Montgomery county.

• Gilmor elementary school has 43.3% in reading proficiency, 46.2% in math proficiency, 544 are enrolled, 52% are economicall disadvantaged, and 100% of their students are black.
• North Forestville elementary school holds 46.2% in reading proficiency, 66.3% in math proficiency, 389 are enrolled, 59.4% are economically disadvantaged, 1.3% are white students, 95.1% are black students, and 3.6% are Hispanic students.
• Commodore John Rogers elementary school holds 39.8% in reading proficiency, 43.7% in math proficiency, 237 are enrolled, a drastic 92.4% are economically disadvantaged, 3% are white students, 84.4% are black students, 8.4% are Hispanic students, and 4.2% are Asian students.
• Wood Acres elementary school has 94.5% in reading proficiency, 94.6% in math proficiency, 607 are enrolled, 1.5% are economically disadvantaged, 85.2% are white students, 2% are black students, 5.9% are Hispanic students, and 6.9% are Asian students.

We also looked at several statistics concering the households from these students attending the elementary schools. The following shows a comparison of the percentage of people (age 25+) with a college degree, the median household income, and the median age of the housing structure:

• 17% of people in Gilmor's zip code (age 25+) have a college degree, the median household income is $20,637, and the median age of the housing structure is 69 years old.
• 19% of people in North Forestville's zip code (age 25+) have a college degree, the median household income is $33,415, and the median age of the housing structure is 57 years old.
• 34% of people in Commodore John Rogers' zip code (age 25+) have a college degree, the median household income is $30,121, and the median age of the housing structure is 69 years old.
• 82% of people in Wood Acres' zip code (age 25+) have a college degree, the median household income is $118,631, and the median age of the housing structure is 52 years old.

In addition, we have compared these numbers with the Maryland state average:

• 32% of people (age 25+) have a college degree, the median household income is $51,114, and the median age of the housing structure is 42 years old. (from publicschoolreview.com)

Here are some questions to consider:

1. Why do you think it is that percentages and numbers in Wood Acres are much more favorable to its students (than the other schools)? Is this is a big problem?
2. If you could, what is the one thing you would do to shift the opportunity to students living in Baltimore city?
3. Do these numbers/statistics surprise you? Why or why not?
4. What do the "people with a college degree (age 25+)" percentages tell us? Is there something we can do to change this?

Questions

1. In your opinion, do you believe segregation exists in public schools today?
2. Dose it surprise you that Baltimore City Public Schools contain 89% black students, 8% white students, 2% Hispanic students, and less than 1% Asian students when the state average is 38% black students, 48% white students, 8% Hispanic students, and 5% Asian students?
3. If you believe segregation exists, do you think it affects the student's self-esteem?
4. If a student grows up in a segregated school or community, do you believe they can "break the segregation cycle" or will they continue to follow the cycle?
5. How hard to you think it is for a student to overcome segregation in their own school or do you believe is it just a norm since they grew up that environment.

Hello world!

To introduce ourselves, we are current students of Towson University located in Baltimore, Maryland. In our School and American Society course, we were prompted to research and inform the public of a topic of interest in relation to Baltimore City.

We are currently and will forever be in the process of this research. We wanted to choose an outlet that we not only can update for the rest of our careers, but can prove to the world a progressive issue in our hands.

The topic we are concentrating on is segregation in the neighborhoods and the classrooms of Baltimore City. We will be looking to compare neighboring counties such as: Howard, Carroll, Montgomery, Frederick and Baltimore County.

For those of you who may not be in the education field, or in the state of Maryland, and have found yourself at this very blog - Please read on anyway! The topic we've chosen to discuss is everywhere!

Thank you for your time!
And make sure you check back soon!
Chelsea, Danielle, and Karen



For further contact:
BeMore.BeOne@gmail.com