A hallmark of racism--and racism's opponents--is it is general and static in its thinking. Yet the objective results are anything but. Currently the school test scores of American children, black vs. white, shows significant disparities; blacks generally do poorly in comparison. Yet in the 1940s there was no such gap on test scores between black schools in Harlem and white, working-class schools on New York's lower east side (according to results reviewed in the fall 1981 issue of "Teachers College Record," a journal published by Columbia University.)
Not only do bad testing results not travel over time well, they don't cross borders. In his book "Life at the Bottom," British physician Theodore Dalrymple said that, among the patients he treated in a hospital near a low-income housing project, he could not recall any white 16-year-old who could multiply nine by seven. Some could not even do three times seven.
The Nov. 9-15 issue of the British magazine "The Economist" reports that, among children who are eligible for free meals in England's schools, black children of immigrants from Africa meet the standards of school academic tests nearly 60% of the time — as do immigrant children from Bangladesh and Pakistan. Black children of immigrants from the Caribbean meet the standards less than 50% of the time.
At the bottom, bottom, among those children who are all from families with low enough incomes to receive free meals at school, are white English children, who meet the standards 30% of the time.
This problem is a lot harder than any of the combatants think.
Not only do bad testing results not travel over time well, they don't cross borders. In his book "Life at the Bottom," British physician Theodore Dalrymple said that, among the patients he treated in a hospital near a low-income housing project, he could not recall any white 16-year-old who could multiply nine by seven. Some could not even do three times seven.
The Nov. 9-15 issue of the British magazine "The Economist" reports that, among children who are eligible for free meals in England's schools, black children of immigrants from Africa meet the standards of school academic tests nearly 60% of the time — as do immigrant children from Bangladesh and Pakistan. Black children of immigrants from the Caribbean meet the standards less than 50% of the time.
At the bottom, bottom, among those children who are all from families with low enough incomes to receive free meals at school, are white English children, who meet the standards 30% of the time.
This problem is a lot harder than any of the combatants think.
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