“What on earth is whiteness that one should so desire it? Then always, somehow, some way, silently but clearly, I am given to understand that whiteness is the ownership of the earth forever and ever, Amen.”
-W.E.B. Dubois
One of the great voices in education today, Chris Stewart of Citizen Education, has a great piece in the Washington Post. He takes the issue integration in schools head on with clarity and grace. The bottom line is this: if the majority class (white people) wanted to see integrated schools, we would already have integrated schools. There are dozens of under-enrolled schools dotting the West and South sides in Chicago. I am not aware of many white school integrationist rushing to send their students to those schools.
Unless one falls into the camp that so perplexed Dubois in 1921 – convinced that whiteness itself and the proximity to whiteness has some value – we must agree with Chris that while integration is a worthy objective, the priority is quality for all.
Check out the Washington Post article here.


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