urban/suburban school partnerships. north high school. good or bad.

as a continuation from my previous post i want to talk about where to draw the line on schooling. I coached for an urban school this past fall and found myself loving it. As much as was afraid as a white dude going into a primarily african american setting, I loved it. I was afraid because I did not know if there was anything I could do to help. Was it my place to help? What needed to be helped for that matter? As a white man could I offer anything to these kids or were they offering something to me? The decision to get involved was to be more active in my community and it led me to this high school. I was fortunate enough to have been asked to join the staff as an assistant coach and work with the kids. I spent May - November with them and it was eye opening. Listening to the conversations and seeing the emotional reactions to what I would consider are minute things in life, really shocked me. Seeing these students and athletes every day for several months allowed me to see a little piece of their life. It sucked me in like a magnet. I wanted to know more and I wanted to see what I could do to be more of a support to the schools and the students. That is all to say I have grown to want to be more involved and a part of the these kids and kids like them. My passion in this leads me to my subject.

I recently did a research project on integration in schools in the Twin Cities for my grad school application. This all centered around the possibility of North High School getting shut down. In a nutshell, I learned the NAACP has a funded program called "Choice Is Your's" where money is offered to families on low income to bus their kids to partnering suburban schools to "get a better education" because the Minneapolis Public Schools, specifically North High School is not properly educating students. After my research I have realized that I do not think the answer is sending kids out of their communities. I do not feel that sending these kids to white suburban schools is helping with their education, especially when many of these schools do not have the capacity to teach and relate with urban students. The culture is different, the language is different, and therefore the relationships between teacher and student have to be different. In addition to that, there are an estimated 10,000 kids in North Minneapolis alone that are not even attending school. THAT is a problem!  I understand with Minneapolis changing the zoning laws and not allowing bussing between North and South Mpls has changed some things and funding in North Mpls causes problems too, but is there something that can be done? Sure some of these students getting bussed out are learning in classes, but many are not. Many are not reaping any benefits from these schools and then they are spending an hour or more on a bus traveling back and forth from home. But what is the alternative? Dropping out of school? Never attending high school? Joining a gang? Trying to find a job to support the family? If they do find a job, it is most likely an under paying job. I just want to see all kids with an opportunity to go to school and succeed.
I would love if anyone could shed more light on this. I do not claim to know everything there is to know about this situation and clearly I cannot write everything I learned in my research. I also do not want to be naive to the fact that this exists and I would welcome the chance to learn more about it.
I do know that these kids need an education or this world is not going to be kind to them. There has to be something that can be done.