The Long Shadow – Memphis Flyer

Greg Cravens

About Bruce VanWyngarden’s editor’s note, “Sammons ‘R Us” …

I read Bruce VanWyngarden’s editorial for the March 12th issue with stunned disbelief. We’re all supposed to be happy not only that this “connected” character, Jack Sammons, has lots of power but also will now “run” a newspaper? Never mind how irrelevant your paper is now. Surely one doesn’t have to go all the way back to the great muckraker days to find journalists who would be troubled by a chief officer of anything running their own paper? And I guess your new position on “pesky laws” that prevent conflict of interest is that they are unnecessary relics of the past? But congratulations on thoroughly brown-nosing your new boss on his way through the door.

John E. Cox

Editor’s note: Mr. Cox, I read your letter in stunned disbelief, as well.

About Bianca Phillips’ cover story, “Getting Schooled” …

Sounds like a lot of territorial bickering between two entities, “This is my school yard and I don’t care if you want to put down green grass for the children to play on; our dirt yard is just fine, so go away.” Our local school system has failed for years in educating our children and it sounds like the schools that have been taken over by the ASD are making a lot of positive gains and turn-arounds. The priority here is educating our children and we should be willing to do whatever it takes to get this done.

Pamela Cates

About Wendi C. Thomas’ column, “The Long Shadow” …

If the family structure is a primary predictor of an individual’s life chances, and if family disintegration is the principal cause of the transmission of poverty and despair in the black community over the past 50 years, then family integration will stabilize the institution and offer children hope.

For once and for all, we must reach out and “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Walking on eggshells out of fear or guilt, being angry at the sins of the past, or throwing money at a problem that only the heart can solve must end.

MempHis1

It’s a puzzle: “middle and upper class parents who hoard opportunity for their kids” are the same people who oppress by riding in bike lanes.

Brunetto Latini

About Jackson Baker’s post, “Flinn: Change of Venue Not the Reason for Leaving Council” …

Personally, I’m glad Shea is leaving. His lack of lunacy and apparent common sense really took away from the overall character of the council. Ditto for that other stick in the mud Jim Strickland. We need more dancing and redacted credit card invoices!

Smitty1961

About Tim Sampson’s Rant …

It was interesting to discover that three of the seven Republicans who did not sign Senator Tom Cotton’s letter to the leaders of Iran were Bob Corker, Lamar Alexander, and Thad Cochran.

For these three men, it would have been in their best political interests to go along with the rest of their Republican colleagues. But they put their country above their own political interests and refused to sign a letter that was so wrong and dangerous in so many ways and one that may guarantee that a deal in the best interests of the U. S. and the entire world is not reached.

These Senators should be praised for showing real leadership and real political courage.

Philip Williams

About Bruce VanWyngarden’s editor’s note, “The Heart and Soul of Memphis” …

I was born and raised in Memphis but now call Nashville home. I live in the middle of one of the hottest neighborhoods in the country’s “It City,” but still miss the soul of Memphis. It’s something that all the new money, popularity, real estate prices, and relocated hipsters will never understand … and certainly can’t replicate.

MT Blake

Honest conversations about education reform generate more questions than answers.

Are charter schools the answer to what ails poor children? What will it take to turn low-performing schools around? How can public schools best prepare disadvantaged students for college and careers?

To those queries, allow me to add another: What if we’re asking the wrong questions? Is it possible that what happens in classrooms doesn’t matter nearly as much as education reformers say it does?

What if it’s not public schools that need fixing? What if the problem is hyper-segregated neighborhoods and a job market riddled with race and gender favoritism? What if the problem isn’t poor children who struggle to learn but middle- and upper-class parents who hoard opportunity for their kids?

What if we viewed economic and educational inequality not from the stoop where the disadvantaged sit, but from the perch of those who inherit advantage that they rarely share?

If you weren’t pondering those things before, you will after reading The Long Shadow, which chronicles a groundbreaking study of 790 first graders in the Baltimore public schools.

Starting in 1982, Johns Hopkins University researchers Karl Alexander, Doris Entwisle, and Linda Olson followed these students’ education and career path for nearly 25 years. Some of the students were white, some were black, some of low socioeconomic standing (measured by household income, the parents’ education level and their occupation) and some of relatively higher standing.

The short version of the study’s findings: Children who are born into poor, disadvantaged families almost always end up where they started, especially when the poor children are black.

For the overwhelming majority of the disadvantaged students, “the promise of upward mobility through educational success has proven to be an empty one,” the book’s authors write.

If you understand how efficiently inequality was designed to reproduce itself, this comes as no surprise. But what surprised Alexander most was how much a family’s access to informal job networks mattered.

When the students in the study were asked as adults how they found their jobs, “Whites were more likely to say through family and friends,” Alexander said. “Blacks said [they found their jobs] on their own and being on your own isn’t a good place to be. The people who had the advantage back in the day still have the advantage today and that’s where race comes into play.”

The institutional, legal racism that once strangled African Americans’ job prospects is largely gone, thanks to equal opportunity employment laws. Still, the African-American unemployment rate is reliably twice that of white Americans. In codified racism’s place are informal networks of access and opportunity that produce virtually the same result.

Here’s one example: More and more companies rely on current employees to find new hires, which in itself isn’t a problem. But people tend to refer people who look like them, which is worrisome for groups historically shut out of the job market. According to a study by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, job candidates who are referred are twice as likely to get an interview. Just over 70 percent of employees recommended job candidates of the same race and 63 percent recommended candidates of the same gender.

Hiring biases could help explain part of why the poverty rate in Memphis is so divergent: Less than 10 percent of white families are poor, compared to 33 percent of African Americans, 47 percent of Latinos, and nearly 15 percent of Asians. This is not a problem that can be fixed in public schools.

That brings me to another set of questions: Is it only education reform we need or should we add some workplace reform too?

Who will train hiring managers to recognize and correct for their biases?

Can we adapt the tools used to measure teacher effectiveness to track how well employers do at hiring people who don’t look like them?

Can we convince charitable foundations that sink millions into education reform to also invest in creating equitable workplaces?

It’s not what you know, it’s who you know. When it comes to finding a job, we unquestioningly accept that as fact. But when it comes to education reform, we insist the reverse is true.

That leads me to my last question: When will we resolve that dissonance?