A Reflection on The Elephant in the Classroom Gentrification is the transformation of run down neighborhoods into more prosperous ones by remodeling and rebuilding the homes and schools. Many big cities in the United States have a “once in a generation opportunity to create a large number of racially and socioeconomically integrated schools.” (Stillman, 2013, p. 37) This article discusses the effect of gentrification by groups of predominantly white, upper-middle class, highly educated families on different urban schools that serve mostly the poor and minority population. Before reading this article I considered this to be a fabulous opportunity that many people would be excited about and have high hopes for. If a group of people were trying to help make a neighborhood, along with its educational setting better, the outcome could only be positive. I was correct in regards to gentrification being an opportunity that many people were excited about. While many gentrifiers were excited for the endeavor at first, once they were in the integrated setting, reality set in, and many facto...
“Gentrification is a general term for the arrival of wealthier people in an existing urban district, a related increase in rents and property values, and changes in the district's character and culture.” (Grant) In layman’s terms, gentrification is when white people move to a black neighborhood for the sake of cheaper living, and in turn, raise up property values and force black neighbors to leave because of a higher price of living. Commonly, the government supports gentrification with the demolition of public housing in areas that are developing with more white neighbors. This is causing a decreasing amount of African Americans to be able to afford to live in the neighborhood as their homes are taken away from them, forcing them to relocate. Whilst gentrification normally has negative connotations, there are several people who believe gentrification brings about “an upward trend in property values in previously neglected neighborhoods.” (Jerzyk) On the other hand, this new trend in property value and business causes those...
Older gentrification is issued onto poor black communities to increase white supremacy in the area and improve living conditions in the so called “hood.” After Older proposed his thoughts on Gentrification being an issue in colored low-income neighborhoods, he then turns to criticizing another writer with a different point of view on the issue. The author of “Is Gentrification All Bad?” in an article in the New York Times explains his views on gentrification. Older places emphasis on one of Davidson’s claim on “sweet spots” in the community saying “Davidson talks of a “sweet spot”: some mythical moment of racial, economic harmony where the neighborhood stays perfectly diverse and balanced.” (Older 358) The author does not support this claim as to being logical in his sense. Older’s views represents an opposite approach on the same issue of gentrification. In another quote “The gears are all already in place, the mechanisms of white supremacy and capitalism poised to make their moves.” (Older 358) the author speaks on how white people are over taking the poor colored communities to improve their lives, but not thinking about the consequences of the affected
In other words, it’s very similar to the “great advantage” of European powers over Native Americans and westward expansion”(Wharton). Wharton conveys that gentrification is a system built to allow the more powerful group to apathetically take the resources they desire with no immediate consequences. In contrast to the negatives of gentrification, some people view gentrification as the only effective way to “revitalize” low-income urban communities. In the article, “Gentrification: A Positive Good For Communities” Turman situates the piece around the opinion that gentrification is not as awful as the negative connotation surrounding it.
The gap between the nation’s best and worst public schools continues to grow. Our country is based on freedom and equality for all, yet in practice and in the spectrum of education this is rarely the case. We do not even have to step further than our own city and its public school system, which many media outlets have labeled “dysfunctional” and “in shambles.” At the same time, Montgomery County, located just northwest of the District in suburban Maryland, stands as one of the top school systems in the country. Within each of these systems, there are schools that excel and there are schools that consistently measure below average. Money alone can not erase this gap. While increased spending may help, the real problem is often rooted in the complex issues of social, cultural, and economic differences. When combined with factors involving the school itself and the institution that supports it, we arrive at what has been widely known as the divide between the suburban and urban schools. Can anything actually be done to reverse this apparent trend of inequality or are the outside factors too powerful to change?
In addition to continuing need for affirmative action, attention must be given to lessening racial segregation, and to improving the lot of the black poor. Without residential segregation—and the social segregation that it engenders—African American communities would not, as they do now, bear nearly the full burden of disproportionate black poverty… [The black poor] would have access to suburbanized jobs, better schools, and safer streets]. (Pattillo, 217,
It is unfair for wealthy neighborhoods with high SES to be able to have better education, opportunities, and achievements while the poor neighborhoods, affected by the low SES, have very low standards of education, opportunities, and achievements but we must consider that these neighborhoods are changing through gentrification, immigration, and through programs that help and support low income families to break out of the culture of poverty.
Gentrification is described as the renovation of certain neighborhoods in order to accommodate to young workers and the middle-class. For an area to be considered gentrified, a neighborhood must meet a certain median home value and hold a percentage of adults earning Bachelor’s degree. Philadelphia’s gentrification rate is among the top in the nation; different neighborhoods have pushed for gentrification and have seen immense changes as a result. However, deciding on whether or not gentrification is a beneficial process can become complicated. Various groups of people believe that cities should implementing policy on advancing gentrification, and others believe that this process shouldn’t executed. Both sides are impacted by the decision to progress gentrification; it is unclear of the true implications of completely renovating impoverished urban areas; gentrification surely doesn’t solve all of a community’s issues. I personally believe that gentrification is not necessarily a good or bad process; gentrification should occur as a natural progression of innovative economies and novel lifestyles collide within certain areas. Policy involving gentrification should not support the removal of people out of their neighborhood for the sake of advancement.
In the Educational Leadership article entitled “The Story Behind Ferguson” the author, Richard Rothstein, states, “Avoidance of our racial history in the United States is pervasive. And by failing to give our students the facts, we are ensuring that this avoidance will persist for subsequent generations. ” In this article, Rothstein is investigating the racial history of Ferguson, Missouri, a city now infamous for the tragic death of Michael Brown. Ferguson, despite it being casted as a white suburb, is an “urban ghetto.” Rothstein provides statistics such as Ferguson schools have eighty-five percent black people and eighty-three of their students need either free or discounted lunch. Student achievement has been at all time lows with thirty percent of them being proficient in math and twenty-five percent being proficient in reading. The author saw how odd it was how a city like Ferguson could be so segregated and so decided to investigate further on the racial history of the metropolitan area.
Prior to this, I had never heard of any benefit of gentrification; rather, I had the typical preconceived notion that Freeman discusses: gentrification is a demonic force that inflicts suffering in all poor people in a gentrified neighborhood. However, reading excerpts from “There Goes the ‘Hood” encourages me to rethink my position. One of my questions from the reading pertains to the “race” part of the author’s argument. Although Clinton Hill and Harlem are both predominantly comprised of African Americans, I wonder how low-income white residents feel about gentrification. I am curious about this because a friend of mine, a white Irish, was displaced from her home in Sunnyside, Queens last summer because of increasing rent. From this experience, I think that seeing low-income whites’ outlooks on white gentry would be interesting. Furthermore, I question the validity of the author’s selection on some of the participants for his interview, particularly those whom he recruited in a conference on gentrification (page 12). One could imagine that community members who attend such a conference would hold strong opinions about gentrification. However, would not this contradict his earlier point that “the most active and vocal residents are not necessarily representative of the entire neighborhood and are likely different” (page 7) and thus undermining the integrity of some of his
Gentrification is designed to improve the quality of life for the residents, but the fact is that it pushes out old residents to welcome in young and wealthy citizens. To analyze the demographic even further, gentrified neighborhoods in New York City have seen an increase in white population despite a city wide decrease. As Kate Abbey-Lamertz of the Huffington Post states, “The report notes that change is driven by educated people moving in, rather than by existing residents becoming more educated.” These changes are being driven by a millennial demographic who can afford the changed aesthetic. The influx of millennials are pushing out families whose lifestyle can’t keep up with the changing demographic. Even though these changes have been occurring for almost thirty years, and the city hasn’t made the changes needed for people who need low income housing. New York City’s gentrification must be slowed in order for people in low income housing to catch
As stated before, a neighborhood plays an important factor in the upbringing of children and youths. Living in a poverty stricken neighborhood has negative consequences such as a lower educational achievement and a higher chance of committing crimes. The wealth concentrated in affluent neighborhoods stays in the neighborhood and are rarely spreaded to areas in poverty. Children growing up in poorer neighborhoods are not given the same opportunities as children growing up in well-of neighborthoods to gain a higher education because of the resources that are offered. As a result, poor socioeconomic areas remain the same over time because of the lack of resources introduced into the area.
If you were to compare Woodlawn High school and Catonsville High school, you’ll notice a huge difference in how many students are currently attending the school as well as the racial demographic in each of the schools. It isn’t just schools, but if you look at Baltimore City and look closely into it you’ll notice that most of the houses in certain areas are completely abandoned, some areas are over populated, people living in property, and lastly segregation in certain areas of
There is a big disparity between urban and suburban secondary education in public schools. Many critics of this inequality are arguing that urban schools are not receiving the same attention as schools that are in suburban areas or wealthier parts of country. Urban schools are facing a large crisis on there hands, these schools are not meeting the required criteria in educating and graduating their students. So, why is there a huge inequality between urban and suburban secondary public schools? Much of the debate falls around school funding and how much schools are given to operate. Many urban schools are not being given enough money to educate its students, pay its teachers, buy new books, and afford technology that could be used in the classroom in order to educate its students. Though funding plays an important role in education another issue that urban schools are facing is prejudice from teacher towards minority and lower income students; students who fit description are often thought of as worthless because either they are receiving low test scores, can not speak English well, create trouble in the classroom or they are simply thought of as futile. While minorities fall under prejudice, illegal immigrant students are being attacked because they are attending public schools at the expense of tax payers. Illegal immigrants are being blamed for much of reasons that schools are finding themselves in the red when it comes to school funding; simply illegal immigrants are breaking the piggy bank and leaving schools in the hole as the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) puts it. In retrospect what ultimately is happening is that students in urban secondary public schools whom...
When talking about a school that is mostly filled with African Americans, it is common to picture it as somewhere that has limited programs due to low funding from the government and located where poverty rate is high. Normally the thought of a brand new facility or more investment in schools is not associated with African American schools. The universal problem of mostly black schools is the fact that there is a lack of funding for the school and it...
It’s no well-kept secret that inner city impoverished neighborhoods produce some of the lowest test scores in the nation. It is not necessarily the children’s fault that they perform poorly, they are simply victims of their environment, one of apathy, greed, and a lack of academic importance in life. Most of their parents are not well educated, and as statistics show, they will not be either. Often, inner city youths, good children to begin with, become entrapped in a vortex of negativity stemming from a community that does not care to support them in a positive manner, and prominent negative influences abundantly tempting them, such as drugs, violence, and crime. Given the right opportunity and nurturing, any of these children could very well grow up to be professional college educated people with a wide variety of degrees allowing them to positively contribute to society and become as beneficiary as the influences they, themselves had as children. The problem is that there is not that initial stimulus of support that is so necessary in the development of a child’s life and long-term orientation.