Disproportionate numbers of black students do poorly on standardized tests; strategies to improve American education thus frequently target inner-city schools. These strategies often have an unrecognized affirmative action component. A search for more minority students or teachers is clearly an affirmative action effort, but the elimination of all tracking or competency grouping is another matter. It is normally viewed as nothing more than a pedagogical strategy, but in fact, like other affirmative action efforts, it amounts to a conscious effort to alter the low-track status of minority pupils. Similarly, the demand for curricular reforms, racial sensitivity training, and more culturally appropriate tests, while not obviously affirmative action strategies, are in fact precisely that. They attempt to broaden the definition of excellence and to create a more racially inclusive educational system. Such well-meaning strategies are not likely to close the racial gap in school performance. That task may call for quite a different approach.
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References
1.
1. For the statistical work on student achievement, I am indebted to Stephan Thernstrom.
2.
2. National Center for Education Statistics, Trends in Academic Progress: Achievements of U.S. Students in Science, 1969-70 to 1990; Mathematics, 1973 to 1990; Reading, 1971 to 1990; and Writing, 1984-1990 (Washington, DC: Office of Education, 1991), pp. 26, 64, 112, 152.
3.
3. Hobson v. Hansen, 269 F. Supp. 401, 485 (D.D.C. 1967).
4.
4. Larry P. v. Riles, 495 F. Supp. 926, 957 (1979).
5.
5. Ibid., p. 959.
6.
6. Charles V. Willie, “The Unfair Effects of Standardized Testing on Blacks and Other Minorities,” in The Prices of Secrecy: The Social, Intellectual and Psychological Costs of Current Assessment Practice, ed. Judah L. Schwartz and Katherine A. Viator (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Graduate School of Education, Educational Technology Center, 1990), p. 24.
7.
7. Larry P. v. Riles, 495 F. Supp. at 958.
8.
8. David Nicholson, “Afrocentrism and the Tribalization of America,”Washington Post National Weekly Edition, 8-14 Oct. 1990, p. 23.
9.
9. Michelle Guido, “Californians Debate Halting Use of IQ Test,”Chicago Tribune, 18 Aug. 1991.
10.
10. Carol Chomsky, “Language and Language Arts Assessment,” in Prices of Secrecy, ed. Schwartz and Viator, p. 74.
12. Mark A. Uhlig, “Learning Style of Minorities to Be Studied,”New York Times, 21 Nov. 1987, p. 29.
13.
13. Carol Innerst, “Definition of `Intelligence' Grows in the Name of Diversity,”Washington Times, 28 May 1990.
14.
14. Ibid.
15.
15. This is certainly the implication contained in his approving citation of the Asa Hilliard testimony arguing that blacks and whites disagree over the meaning of common words.
16.
16. Guido, “Californians Debate.”
17.
17. Jeannie Oakes, Keeping Track: How Schools Structure Inequality (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985), p. 11.
18.
18. Willie, “Unfair Effects,” p. 22. Willie was referring to Scholastic Aptitude Tests, but he would obviously extend the point to standardized tests in general.
19.
19. Kenneth J. Cooper, “Exams Opposed over Potential Harm to Minorities,”Washington Post, 12 June 1991.
20.
20. Larry P. v. Riles, 343 F. Supp. 1306, 1310 (1972).
21.
21. Ibid.
22.
22. Larry P. v. Riles, 495 F. Supp. at 944 (1979).
23.
23. The point is made by many commentators. See, for example, Eva Wells Chun, “Sorting Black Students for Success and Failure: The Inequity of Ability Grouping and Tracking,” in Black Education: A Quest for Equity and Excellence, a special edition of Urban League Review, 11(1-2):93-106 (Summer 1987-Winter 1987-88).
24.
24. Larry P. v. Riles, 343 F. Supp. at 1312.
25.
25. On the assertion that racists designed the tests to begin with, see, for example, Judge Peckham in Larry P., 495 F. Supp. at 955: “The experts have from the beginning been willing to tolerate or even encourage tests that portray minorities, especially blacks, as intellectually inferior.” He rested his conclusion on the work of Professor L. J. Kamin. See Kamin, The Science and Politics of IQ (Potomac, MD: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1974).
26.
26. Larry P. v. Riles, 495 F. Supp. at 944.
27.
27. ABC News, 4 Sept. 1990. The reporter quoted was Bill Blakemore. See also Chun, “Sorting Black Students,” p. 100: “Even high-achieving blacks tend to be placed in low ability groups or tracks, while low-achieving white, middle-class students tend to be placed in high tracks or ability groups.”
30. Diego Ribadeneira, “ `Tracking' Cheats Needy Students in City, Study Says,”Boston Globe, 27 Mar. 1990.
31.
31. Oakes, Keeping Track, p. 153.
32.
32. FairTest: National Center for Fair and Open Testing (Cambridge, MA), “K-12 Testing Fact Sheet” (Brochure, n.d.).
33.
33. Locked in/Locked Out: Tracking and Placement Practices in Boston Public Schools (Cambridge: Massachusetts Advocacy Center, Mar. 1990), p. 11.
34.
34. In theory, antitracking advocates could recognize the need for some differentiation between students but insist on racial quotas in the different academic levels. In fact, that is what the plaintiffs in Larry P. demanded: racial quotas in the EMR classes. The judge rejected that notion, however. In addition, in 1971 a Californian legislative declaration prohibited disproportionately high numbers of students who were members of any racial or ethnic group in EMR classes, but the legislation had no teeth. These California demands and declaration are unique, to the best of my knowledge.
35.
35. Los Angeles Times, 9 Nov. 1990.
36.
36. Frank Wolfe, “Fairfax Schools Hunt for Gifted Minorities,”Washington Times, 8 Aug. 1991.
37.
37. Telephone conversation with staff at the school, 9 Jan. 1992.
38.
38. Morgan v. Kerrigan, 401 F. Supp. 216 (1975). No school was forced to take students that scored below the fiftieth percentile on the Secondary Scholastic Aptitude Test, however.
39.
39. Los Angeles Times, 9 Nov. 1990.
40.
40. Locked in/Locked Out, p. 58.
41.
41. Thus in San Francisco in early 1970s, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People opposed making admissions at an elite magnet school noncompetitive. In Boston there has been similar resistance.
42.
Molefi Kete Asante and Diane Ravitch, “Multiculturalism: An Exchange,”American Scholar, 60:267-276 (Spring 1991).
43.
43. See New York State Social Studies Review and Development Committee, “One Nation, Many Peoples: A Declaration of Cultural Interdependence” (Report, June 1991).
44.
44. Bob Hotakainen, “Desegregation Plans Sought: State Will Require Action by Suburban Districts,”Star Tribune (Minneapolis), 14 May 1991.
45.
Sharon Britton , “A Fast-Changing Andover Rethinks Its View of the World,” ibid., 2 June 1991.
48. Gerald David Jaynes and Robin M. Williams, Jr., eds., A Common Destiny: Blacks and American Society (Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1989), p. 364.
49.
49. Bob Hotakainen, “Incentives Urged to Attract Minority Teachers to State,”Star Tribune (Minneapolis), 14 Aug. 1991.
50.
50. Patrick Welsh, “A Lesson in Reading, Writing—and Red Tape: The Problem Our School Bureaucracies Create,”Washington Post, 2 Dec. 1990.
