All posts in the topic Minn Post School Segregation series #4 (Short link)

From: Doug Mann Date: Nov 21 16:11 UTC Short link

The MN desegregation rule allows school districts to operate 'racially
identifiable' schools so long as the racially identifiable schools have
educational
inputs that are roughly equal to schools within the same district that are not
equal.

In the 2007 North Side Initiative, the Minneapolis school district
acknowledges a big school quality gap between North Side schools (many being
racially
identifiable). And teacher turnover is recognized as the single most important
educational input to address in the 2002 district improvement plan and in the
2008 Covenant with representatives of the African American community.

The Minneapolis School District has had insanely high teacher turnover rates
in nearly all of its many racially identifiable schools because few of the
teachers who are hired by the district are allowed to complete their 3 year,
post-hire probationary period. The teacher job bidding system has always played
a
minor role. Most of the teacher turnover is driven by the district's practice
of firing probationary teachers in the spring and replacing many in the Fall.
That's the only way you can explain how about one-third of the district's
tenure-track teachers were on probationary status at the beginning of the
current
century. Job cuts since then have shrunk the pool, but there is still a
revolving door for new teachers who are heavily concentrated in racially
identifiable schools.

Why do I focus on the issue of teacher turnover rates? It matters a lot. It a
ccounts for a big part of the school quality gap and the racial achievement
gap that goes with it. The Minneapolis School District can easily eliminate
this
disparity. It appears that the Desegregation Rule requires the Minneapolis
School District to fix this problem. And it is a problem that could be fixed
without increasing the Minneapolis District's per-pupil operating costs for at
least a few years.

Aside from any inherent benefits of racial and class integration, academic
and otherwise, to students of all races, the policy of "root and branch"
desegregation demanded by the US Supreme Court for several years following the
1968
Green Decision helped to reduce the school quality gap and the achievement gap
that goes with it.

-Doug Mann, most popular Minneapolis School Board candidate in 3 U of MN
precinct in 2008.