{"id":5971,"date":"2016-03-05T22:46:59","date_gmt":"2016-03-05T22:46:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/?p=5971"},"modified":"2016-03-05T22:46:59","modified_gmt":"2016-03-05T22:46:59","slug":"student-cant-attend-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/blog\/2016\/03\/student-cant-attend-school\/","title":{"rendered":"Thanks to Court Ruling, Student Literally Can\u2019t Attend School Because He\u2019s Black – Article by Carey Wedler"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"The<\/a>Carey Wedler<\/span>
\n<\/big><\/big><\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
******************************<\/div>\n
\n

St. Louis, MO<\/i> \u2014 An African-American third-grader in St. Louis, Missouri will be unable to continue attending his charter school due to a decades-old federal court decision intended to fight segregation. Edmund Lee, a high-performing student at Gateway Science Academy, will be forced to leave the school he has attended since kindergarten because he and his mother, La\u2019Shieka White, are moving away from the district where the school is located. Though policy guidelines, pursuant to the court decision, allow students to stay if they move, a provision specifically states he cannot \u2014 because he is black.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I read the guidelines I was in shock<\/i>,\u201d White said<\/a>. \u201cI was crying<\/i>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Though media outlets, including Salon<\/i><\/a>, have reported this anachronistic decision to be a result of state law, the policy is actually a result<\/a> of a U.S. Court of Appeals ruling from\u00a01980 in response to a 1972 lawsuit challenging segregation. In 1983, a desegregation settlement agreement was reached that included \u201cthe transfer of black city students into primarily white suburban districts and white suburban students into magnet schools in the city<\/i>,\u201d explains<\/a>\u00a0the Voluntary Interdistrict Choice Corporation, the organization tasked with overseeing the implementation of the 1983 settlement. Until 1999, VICC stood for the Voluntary Interdistrict Coordinating Council, but in 1999, it became a non-profit corporation and the name was changed.<\/p>\n

Kurt Fuchs, an employee with the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (MDESE), told Anti-Media<\/i> that Edmund will be able to finish his current semester at Gateway Science Academy, but noted he will have to relocate to a new school next year. He explained that the 1983 settlement agreement was reached when St. Louis\u2019 demographic was predominantly black, and the court decision sought to implement what could be called reverse discrimination.<\/p>\n

Sarah Potter, a communications coordinator for the MDESE, explained the settlement initiated transfers intended to equalize race distribution in schools. She said when the agreement was drafted, the region had predominantly white suburbs and predominantly black cities, a demographic the settlement sought to change.<\/p>\n

Though the agreement was intended to undo segregation, more than 30 years later it has become a justification for it. Edmund\u2019s mother expressed a broad view of the issues with the court-mandated policy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want it to be just about an African-American boy<\/i>,\u201d she said. \u201cI want it to be about all children.<\/i>\u201d<\/p>\n

Staff at the charter school are also dismayed at the way the decades-old policy is now perpetuating the very discrimination it was intended to prevent.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf this helps us start a conversation about maybe some things that could be different with the law, then that is as good thing<\/i>,\u201d said<\/a> Assistant Principal Janet Moak.<\/p>\n

Tiffany Luis, Edmund\u2019s third grade teacher, said, \u201cTo not see his face in the halls next year would be extremely sad<\/i>.\u201d<\/p>\n

David Glaser, VICC\u2019s chief executive officer, told Anti-Media<\/i> they are unable to challenge the policy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI understand why people would like to do [something] different, but there isn\u2019t anything I can do \u2014 or that anyone can do \u2014 because we are all under the constraints of the decision, and it\u2019s our job to follow the law,<\/i>\u201d he said. He suggested it is unlikely an exception will be made for Edmund because the court\u2019s decision \u2014 and the subsequent 1983 desegregation agreement \u2014 are legally binding federal court mandates. \u201cIt\u2019s not like we can unilaterally change it<\/i>,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

As of Thursday afternoon, a petition<\/a> seeking to allow Edmund to continue his studies at Gateway has garnered over 35,000 signatures. In spite of public outcry, however, it appears that for now, the anti-segregation policy will continue to enforce discrimination.<\/p>\n

Glaser noted that even the state legislature can\u2019t do anything because the state of Missouri signed the agreement when it was crafted.<\/p>\n

As Tiffany Luis said, \u201cThe family is saying they want to stay. I don\u2019t understand why they can\u2019t.<\/i>\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Carey Wedler joined Anti-Media as an independent journalist in September of 2014. Her topics of interest include the police and warfare states, the Drug War, the relevance of history to current problems and solutions, and positive developments that drive humanity forward. She currently resides in Los Angeles, California, where she was born and raised.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This article (Thanks to Court Ruling, Student Literally Can\u2019t Attend School Because He\u2019s Black<\/a>) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons<\/a> license with attribution to Carey Wedler<\/a> and theAntiMedia.org<\/a>. Anti-Media Radio<\/a> airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern\/8 pm Pacific.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Carey Wedler ****************************** St. Louis, MO \u2014 An African-American third-grader in St. Louis, Missouri will be unable to continue attending his charter school due to a decades-old federal court decision intended to fight segregation. Edmund Lee, a high-performing student at Gateway Science Academy, will be forced to leave the school he has attended since kindergarten because he and his mother, La\u2019Shieka White, are moving away from the district where the school is located. Though policy guidelines, pursuant to the court…<\/p>\n

Read More Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[87,1634,177],"tags":[4257,166,2895,1288,3548,183,184,4591],"class_list":["post-5971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-education-2","category-justice","tag-carey-wedler","tag-education","tag-injustice","tag-justice-2","tag-missouri","tag-race","tag-racism","tag-voluntary-interdistrict-choice-corporation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5971"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5971\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5973,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5971\/revisions\/5973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}