Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I think too much is being made of an issue in which the principal seems to have been trying to create classrooms where no one Black student was the proverbial one-and-only, which is actually found to negatively impact students that have to experience the microagressions and other things that happen in that sort of setting. Schools have to make dozens of decisions as they shape the classes, and as someone who experienced being the one-and-only, I'm glad they took that into consideration. The parents who requested a specific teacher were able to be accommodated, but they're still unhappy for whatever reason.
Last summer there was a nationwide movement on Instagram called Blackat___ where Black students shared their experiences, and I'm sure this is top of mind for a lot of school administrators. Most of the private and many of the public schools in Atlanta have a Black@ Instagram account. Read those and tell me that putting Black students in situations where they're the one-and-only is a good idea. Here are a few to check out:
I think too much is being made of an issue in which the principal seems to have been trying to create classrooms where no one Black student was the proverbial one-and-only, which is actually found to negatively impact students that have to experience the microagressions and other things that happen in that sort of setting. Schools have to make dozens of decisions as they shape the classes, and as someone who experienced being the one-and-only, I'm glad they took that into consideration. The parents who requested a specific teacher were able to be accommodated, but they're still unhappy for whatever reason.
Last summer there was a nationwide movement on Instagram called Blackat___ where Black students shared their experiences, and I'm sure this is top of mind for a lot of school administrators. Most of the private and many of the public schools in Atlanta have a Black@ Instagram account. Read those and tell me that putting Black students in situations where they're the one-and-only is a good idea. Here are a few to check out:
I mean they have it on tape where an APS Administrator admitting not only was it true but it was wrong. My two children went to that very school. They are mixed race. I can assure you there were plenty of microaggressions and bullying etc. but it wasn't like how you are trying to paint it. I have first hand experiences with that school. We didn't think to make an instagram page to document it. Nor did we ask for segregation. Maybe we should have? I doubt it would go over well it would probably disappear like the #stopasianhate pretty much disappeared after it was discovered one demographic was committing 85% of the violence against Asian Americans. Segregation was wrong 70 years ago and it is wrong now. Advocating for or making excuses/rationalizations for blatant segregation in 2021 is vile. Seems APS HQ agrees with me.
Normally, I would feel the same way. But then I would notice four or five posters who would consistently cosign several of his comments. Then you would have seemingly “neutral” people who would chime in like, “Well, he does have a point… “.
Since I imagine this forum is viewed by many people to get information about Atlanta, there are some pieces of misinformation that I find it hard to just let ride. When I refer to some people being uninformed, it is not a diss. There are just some things that people do not know or have not really considered about certain topics.
So most of the time, the responses are not necessarily for him or the posters that can be construed as racist. I just don’t like having such fallacious information just hanging out in a public forum unaddressed.
I assume that most of the posters on here are reasonable and intelligent people. So I sometimes hope that when his rants or comments are met with reasoned and logical arguments, that the general public can see how flimsy his various “points” are regarding race, crime, etc.
But you are right, I will try to do a better job of just ignoring the crazy commentary and keep it moving.
Just add him and his crew to your ignore list. It is the only way to make this place tolerable these days.
I mean they have it on tape where an APS Administrator admitting not only was it true but it was wrong. My two children went to that very school. They are mixed race. I can assure you there were plenty of microaggressions and bullying etc. but it wasn't like how you are trying to paint it. I have first hand experiences with that school. We didn't think to make an instagram page to document it. Nor did we ask for segregation. Maybe we should have? I doubt it would go over well it would probably disappear like the #stopasianhate pretty much disappeared after it was discovered one demographic was committing 85% of the violence against Asian Americans. Segregation was wrong 70 years ago and it is wrong now. Advocating for or making excuses/rationalizations for blatant segregation in 2021 is vile. Seems APS HQ agrees with me.
APS is saying what it needs to in order to cover its ass. How is this segregation when the classes the kids were in weren't 100% Black? This isn't about old-school tracking of Black students to lower level class work. Out of a class of 20 kids, six would be Black and the rest white or other ethnicities. This is not segregation. That's giving Black kids strength in numbers so they aren't singled out. Wouldn't you have liked it if your kids had other Asian or half Asian kids to relate to?
I feel like there must be more to this story, and I'd like to hear more from the family that complained because I doubt this would be an issue if their child and five other Black kids had gotten the preferred teacher at the outset.
I mean they have it on tape where an APS Administrator admitting not only was it true but it was wrong. My two children went to that very school. They are mixed race. I can assure you there were plenty of microaggressions and bullying etc. but it wasn't like how you are trying to paint it. I have first hand experiences with that school. We didn't think to make an instagram page to document it. Nor did we ask for segregation. Maybe we should have? I doubt it would go over well it would probably disappear like the #stopasianhate pretty much disappeared after it was discovered one demographic was committing 85% of the violence against Asian Americans. Segregation was wrong 70 years ago and it is wrong now. Advocating for or making excuses/rationalizations for blatant segregation in 2021 is vile. Seems APS HQ agrees with me.
I am sorry that your children had to experience that (my children have experienced similar, both among the children of “uber-liberal” parents and more conservative ones). And, if Lin or its principal were unresponsive or dismissive to what your children were experiencing, I understand your anger and resentment. But, do you think your children would have been better off if there were 3 or 4 kids in the classroom that appeared similar to yours? This principal may have done some other things wrong, but *if* she was trying to make sure that a black child was not “the only one” in a class room, I don’t know that what she was doing was wrong.
I am sorry that your children had to experience that (my children have experienced similar, both among the children of “uber-liberal” parents and more conservative ones). And, if Lin or its principal were unresponsive or dismissive to what your children were experiencing, I understand your anger and resentment. But, do you think your children would have been better off if there were 3 or 4 kids in the classroom that appeared similar to yours? This principal may have done some other things wrong, but *if* she was trying to make sure that a black child was not “the only one” in a class room, I don’t know that what she was doing wrong.
jeoff we have nothing bad to say about Mary Lin the administration at the time was very responsive anytime we reached out and they were very accessible. My kids received a great education there and my wife and I see tremendous value in a public school education vs a private one for many reasons. Some of that type of thing is just part of growing up. Kids will be kids. Even though there is more to this story that will come out I would not discourage anyone from sending their kids to Mary Lin. The Principal in question is not going to be there much longer.
jeoff we have nothing bad to say about Mary Lin the administration at the time was very responsive anytime we reached out and they were very accessible. My kids received a great education there and my wife and I see tremendous value in a public school education vs a private one for many reasons. Some of that type of thing is just part of growing up. Kids will be kids. Even though there is more to this story that will come out I would not discourage anyone from sending their kids to Mary Lin. The Principal in question is not going to be there much longer.
Well then, *if* the principal was trying to keep black children from being isolated, how is that necessarily wrong?
My family’s own experience:
While living in a more conservative area being almost “the only one” was so bad that my child’s friend denied that his own father was black—his father special forces and literally looked like a superhero, but the child’s surroundings taught him to feel shame about the color of his skin. My own child only recently told me about his own experiences years ago—intown. He told me that would mostly laugh it off and even play into it—but while he could see what happened to his friend was wrong, he only realized what was going on with himself was pretty messed until years later. I can’t help but think that if either of them were less “the only one” things would have been better.
I think too much is being made of an issue in which the principal seems to have been trying to create classrooms where no one Black student was the proverbial one-and-only, which is actually found to negatively impact students that have to experience the microagressions and other things that happen in that sort of setting. Schools have to make dozens of decisions as they shape the classes, and as someone who experienced being the one-and-only, I'm glad they took that into consideration. The parents who requested a specific teacher were able to be accommodated, but they're still unhappy for whatever reason.
Last summer there was a nationwide movement on Instagram called Blackat___ where Black students shared their experiences, and I'm sure this is top of mind for a lot of school administrators. Most of the private and many of the public schools in Atlanta have a Black@ Instagram account. Read those and tell me that putting Black students in situations where they're the one-and-only is a good idea. Here are a few to check out:
So a Black parent is told they can't get their preferred teacher because Black students are all sent to certain classes. That's NOT a problem?
There seem to have been good intentions by the principal, but he was really tone deaf to what he was doing. Just too common in big bureaucratic organizations.
So a Black parent is told they can't get their preferred teacher because Black students are all sent to certain classes. That's NOT a problem?
There seem to have been good intentions by the principal, but he was really tone deaf to what he was doing. Just too common in big bureaucratic organizations.
*If* that is what happened, and the purpose was to prevent social isolation of the black students, then wouldn’t the issue be that she was trying to go around bureaucracy to find solutions that were correct for her students? If all of the parents had been happy with the result, it would have been a principal finding a local solution to a local problem. At last report, she appears to have had the support of all the parents of black children except for her subordinate who has a child at the school who issued the complaint—and she may have been tone deaf in that case—perhaps she may have thought she was on the same page with that set of parents, and wasn’t (or something else was going on ).
White children are clustered in classrooms. I’ve never once seen people losing their minds over it on here. I wonder why that is.
I don’t wonder at all. It’s a rhetorical question.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
