runrussellrun wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2019 8:39 am
MDlaxfan76 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2019 5:27 pm
Again, folks getting all bent out of shape over the mere notion that the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow should be addressed is pretty disconcerting to me.
Yikes, "reparations"!!!
How unfair! We weren't alive, yada, yada, yada.
Listen, that legacy is real, it has enormous societal costs that continue today.
We need to belly up to that reality and look for better ways to address the persistent after effects.
That doesn't mean a handout. It means investing in the future, empowering all of our citizens to live to their full potential.
Great. Couldn't agree more. You're on a first name basis with your member of US COngress.....what's taking so long to help the blacks of Baltimore? You evah seen an audit of the Baltimore school budget? exactly. One of the largest per student spending, and yet
Start there. Start local.
Ohh, I quite agree that decades of decay and socio-economic/'white flight' have decimated the City public schools, as well as some real mismanagement.
But you only need to try to use the water fountain in many schools (nope those lead pipes haven't been replaced, so no water fountains) to realize that it will take large scale investment to bring schools to anything remotely akin to the physical standards of the surrounding, more affluent counties.
And sure, per student spending is 'high', but when you look at the challenges of dealing with poor nutrition, one or no parents in the home (or out at work in the evening), lead poisoning, PTSD (nearly every kid in most schools has a family member, a friend, or someone within a few blocks of them killed by gunshot in their young lives; Most multiple such; Many have experienced this first hand...the costs are inevitably going to be high per student. Add to that the multiple language challenges, the high degree of kids poorly identified with learning disabilities (cost of actually educating properly someone with garden variety learning challenges is multiples of avg public school per student spend...head over to Odyssey and see the terrific results...and ask what the cost per student is...