Thousands Rally For Education Equity, “A Civil Rights Issue”

education rally
Education rally, New Haven Green.

Bridgeport education advocates, charter school parent supporters and elected officials including Mayor Bill Finch joined thousands braving the weather on the New Haven Green Wednesday morning, urging equity in support of 40,000 urban students they claim are trapped in failing schools. The effort comes in advance of the General Assembly starting its legislative session in January.

From Finch:

“I’m the father of four kids who have attended Bridgeport public schools. I love my kids schools. But we can always do better in our ongoing effort to ensure all kids are getting an education that prepares them to compete for 21st century jobs. That’s why I’m committed to growing pre-k access and afterschool programs, and helping to strengthen all public schools — including traditional, magnets, and charters — by leading the charge for a fairer school funding formula that gives Bridgeport the resources needed to ensure all our kids have access to the high-quality public education they deserve.”

“Connecticut faces an urgent crisis: statewide, there are 40,000 students in failing schools,” said Connecticut NAACP President Scot X. Esdaile. “Almost all are students of color. This is a civil rights issue. The time for bold change is now.”

Event organizers included Northeast Charter Schools Network, For Every Child CT and ConnCAN.

Hartford Courant coverage.

News release from event organizers:

Waving signs with messages of “Great Schools Now!” and “Kids Can’t Wait,” 6,000 parents, students, and educators joined prominent civil rights leaders on the New Haven Green to demand bold action to ensure every Connecticut child can attend an excellent school. Despite progress in recent years, nearly 40,000 children attend 63 persistently failing schools.

Hartford State Representative Doug McCrory joined prominent civil rights leaders and parents on stage at Wednesday’s #ForEveryChild rally, as the crowd surged to a larger-than-projected 6,000 total attendees by 10 am. The rally is the latest and most significant call for leaders to build on recent progress and address the state’s failing schools crisis. The rally comes ahead of a critical legislative session in Connecticut where growing ranks of parents are expected to stress the urgency of ensuring equitable access to excellent schools.

Connecticut’s lowest-performing schools disproportionately serve students of color and low-income students. According to a report recently released by ConnCAN, of the 40,000 students attending persistently failing schools, 87% of students at these schools are African American or Hispanic while 90% of students come from low-income households.

“Connecticut faces an urgent crisis: statewide, there are 40,000 students in failing schools. Almost all are students of color. This is a civil rights issue. The time for bold change is now,” said Connecticut NAACP President Scot X. Esdaile.

“The reality is that if we fail to educate kids now,” said Pastor Eldren Morrison of Varick AME Church in New Haven, “history has proven we will pay the cost of building more prisons later.”

“We are here today to fight for every child,” said parent Tara Maxwell, “we are here to fight for the 40,000 children who are counting on us to fix this crisis.”

“Today we made sure our leaders heard us loud and clear,” said parent Desarie Gonzalez. “We will not stop until every child in Connecticut attends a GREAT school.”

“6,000 people made history today with a simple demand: provide a great school for every Connecticut child, particularly the 40,000 trapped in failing schools,” said Jen Alexander, CEO of ConnCAN.

“Thousands of voices came together today to demand better options for children in our state,” said Jeremiah Grace, Connecticut State Director for the Northeast Charter Schools Network. “Elected leaders need to answer the call and take responsibility for the future of our children. We can’t let another generation slip through the cracks.”

0
Share

9 comments

  1. I normally avoid commenting on this issue as so many groups are to blame for the problems.

    “Connecticut’s lowest-performing schools disproportionately serve students of color and low-income student.”

    The schools are not low-performing. It is the students who are low-performing. Why? Could it be something to do with the people who bring these kids into the world?

    The root cause of the problem is obvious, but the solution will be argued over forever while more low-performing students are brought into the world.

    0
  2. Thank you Bill Finch for being a paid spokesman (paid via campaign contributions) for Charter Schools.
    Stop ignoring the 20,000 students in Bridgeport Public Schools while pandering to the Charter advocates. Be a man. Grow some balls. And start doing your job rather than looking for shortcuts to help a couple of hundred students.

    0
  3. This problem will never be solved by money. The problem starts and will end at home. Parent(s) who do not encourage education, use it as a baby sitter, or themselves casting negative feedback on education are the cause. I personally know kids from the terrace who are smart, but are not encouraged by their parent(s) to succeed.

    0
  4. The problem is largely about money. Money gets you quality child care, quality schools, quality math tutors, reading tutors, and quality extracurricular activities, quality ballet classes and the list continues. It is the reason why families will pay $3,000 a week to have their two children in a quality preschool.

    I ran some preliminary stats last week in fact in which I examined school districts across Connecticut. As the percentage of students with free/reduced lunch in the district increases, third grade CMT scores decrease (as well as math, writing), and this association is statistically significant even when controlling for the percentage of ELL students in the district, district size, and the percent of special education students in the district. (However, the better way to do the analysis is by school, but the data is not readily available yet in this format.)

    In any case, we cannot just ignore things such as poverty and low income matter. And if we want to say it does not matter then there needs to be supporting evidence. Sometimes, we will hear people say something like “I know so and so who lived in poverty and went to college, so poverty is not related to academics.” This is the equivalent of saying “I know so and so who smoked for 40 years and did not get cancer, so smoking is not related to cancer.” Sometimes people will use anecdotal outliers to support their claim, but the bottom line is, yes income, poverty, money–these all matter. And yes, parents matter too, because families can help to offset some of the risks that are brought forth by poverty etc., but their ability to do so is still further complicated by poverty/income.

    Income Matters! Check out socialecologicalresearch.tumblr.com/

    0
  5. Andrew, you are a student of the system that claims everything wrong is a result of lack of taxpayer funding for programs. Of course parenting is complicated by poverty. Since the ‘Great Society’ was introduced, people who are not capable of caring for children, including their education, have been bringing children into the world knowing they can tap into the government programs for housing, food, medical care, etc. Some ‘parents’ bring children into poverty and expect society to address their needs without questioning their lifestyles.

    0
  6. The vast majority in attendance at this rally are charter school children and paid staff. Instead of children being in school and being taught by their teachers, they are bused to the rally wearing green t-shirts. They make almost every paid staff member attend on our taxpayer dollars. The strategy is in photos you see a sea of green t-shirts. What they don’t want you to know is the vast majority of children who could not even articulate why they are there are simply being used as political props for these pro-charter school organizations that are funded by millionaires, billionaires and Wall Street executives.

    The only number I am interested in is how many uncompensated BPS parents or community members were in attendance. My guess is fewer than 20.

    0

Leave a Reply