Parents Want Education
More Than Integration

Survey Finds White and Black Parents Agree
By Robert Stacy McCain
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
July 30, 1998

Education is more important than integration, according to three-quarters of both black and white parents surveyed in a major new poll.

While most parents of both races believe that integrated schools can help improve race relations, the survey by Public Agenda showed that more than 70 percent of parents, black and white, agreed that "too often the schools work so hard to achieve integration that they end up neglecting their most important goal: teaching kids."

The study, released yesterday, said parents are more interested in raising academic standards than in promoting racial integration.

"I think we were all struck by the extraordinarily intense focus on theissue of achievement and accountability and rigor and standards, that were expressed by both groups of parents with no equivocation," said Deborah Wadsworth, executive director of Public Agenda, a nonpartisan policy-analysis group in New York City.

"This study does not say that the goals of integration and equity are unimportant," she said, "but the point of the study is that it is time to focus relentlessly on the quality of education all our children are receiving."

"The results aren't surprising," said Steve Wolmer, a spokesman for the National Education Association. "It tells us pretty much what we already knew: For all parents, the quality of their child's public school is of paramount concern."

Jeanne Allen, president of the Center for Education Reform, quoted a Wisconsin legislator who led the fight for school choice there.

"Polly Williams used to say, 'Give us education and integration will follow,' " she said. "The reason you have more segregated schools in inner cities is because people who can afford to leave do leave."

"It doesn't surprise me that Public Agenda found these results," said Nina Shokraii, education policy analyst for the Heritage Foundation. "If you look at places like Milwaukee, where there is a lot of public support for school choice, minority parents understand that good quality education should come first: A good school will attract students of all racial backgrounds."

Public Agenda surveyed 800 black parents and 800 white parents on questions of education, integration and equal opportunity.

The results showed strong agreement across racial lines on key issues, including:

-- Academic basics: 91 percent of black parents and 95 percent of white parents consider mastery of reading, writing and arithmetic "absolutely essential."

-- High standards: Educators "who push students to study hard and to excel academically" are "absolutely essential," according to 88 percent of black parents and 89 percent of white parents.

-- Fixing failing schools: When asked to rate proposals "to deal with failing schools and African-American students who are not doing well in school," the most popular suggestions with both black and white parents were expanded preschool programs, parent education, permanent expulsion for students caught with drugs or weapons, and removing "troublemakers" from classrooms. Less popular were charter schools, tuition vouchers and "more money and resources" for failing schools.

The survey also showed areas of disagreement. While 60 percent of blackparents said having a racially diverse student body was "absolutely essential" to schools, only 34 percent of white parents agreed.

Black parents were also more supportive than whites of programs that would help low-income families send their children to private schools. Sixty percent of black parents said they would send their children to private schools if they could afford it.

Despite these differences, the survey showed a strong consensus among parents across racial lines.

"What we've done is nailed down, side by side, just how similar their visions really are, for what they want for their kids," Miss Wadsworth said.

Black parents still support integration, but are not convinced that measures like busing have "improved the educational opportunities," Miss Wadsworth said. Integration has "not been a kind of magic wand" for black student achievement, she said.

Mr.Wolmer agreed. "People are committed to diversity, but the most important thing is the quality of their public school," he said.

The study, titled "Time to Move On," was conducted between late March andmid-April, combining telephone surveys with focus groups and individual interviews.

One finding -- meriting a separate chapter of the report -- was that whites "proved reluctant to talk about issues in racial terms" during focus groups, despite "several precautions to make participants ... feel comfortable."

When "academic underachievement among African-American students" was raised in focus groups, the report said, whites' "discomfort was clear."

Whites "take pride in refusing to judge people based on the color of their skin," the Public Agenda report said, but "it is difficult to know whether this carefulness among whites [in speaking about race] reflects a desire to be fair and avoid offending, or whether it cloaks more pernicious assumptions beneath the surface."

© 1998 News World Communications, Inc.

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