MMEP: Why We Cannot Abandon School Integration in Minnesota

3/22/2011 - The MN legislature is considering eliminating the state's integration rule and revenue claiming it has had no outcomes. Parents, students and teachers disagree, believing that building interracial contacts in schools enriches the learning environment and produces better academic outcomes. While traveling to communities across the state to testify at committee hearings – from rural Cottonwood and regional centers like Worthington and Willmar, to Twin Cities communities like Anoka, White Bear Lake and St. Paul – White, Black and Asian citizens pleaded to not undo the state's commitment to promote racially integrated learning opportunities.

MMEP Board member, Mark Robertson, who leads the Northwest Integration School District, presented powerful evidence of academic achievement gains by students of color enrolled in integration revenue funded programs like AVID.

Three students of the East Metro Integration District leadership development team shared that cross-district opportunities to learn together with students from other races develops important problem solving and communication skills. Such skills will be increasingly needed in the future economy and social institutions as our nation becomes more diverse.

Beth Webb shared that integration programs give her rural community one of the few opportunities for students to engage in vital learning about race and racism necessary to produce citizens who will sustain healthy communities.

In the March 21^st New York Times, columnist Bob Herbert gives further explanation on the value of racially, ethnically and economically integrated schools in his op-ed column, “Separate and Unequal.”

Additionally, James Burroughs of Minneapolis, also an MMEP Board member, shared that Minnesota will open itself up to lawsuits by formally abandoning its commitment to preventing segregation of its schools.

Three of MMEP's partner institutions are integration districts created by state law and funded by a special integration revenue program. Minnesota is one of the few states to have such a program and as such, reflects a common-sense approach to fostering racial integration that is not solely dependent on courts imposing on local schools proscribed measures to guarantee equal rights of all students.

The Legislature has struggled with its integration rule for several years after the Legislative Auditor criticized it for lack of clarity on what could be funded with state funds. The discussion centered on whether the purpose was to increase interracial contact or to increase the academic achievement of students of color.

MMEP believes that is a false choice. As a multi-racial society, Minnesota is learning that achievement and inter-racial competence are bound together and that an appropriate expectation of our schools is to produce young citizens with the important skills of building and managing a successful society from our racially diverse reality. These skills are as important as math, science and writing skills.

Join MMEP and citizens from across the state in preserving our state's commitment to integration. Contact your state legislator to encourage preservation of the school integration program. And become an MMEP member here: http://mmep.org/Join_MMEP.html.

-- Carlos Mariani Rosa, MMEP Executive Director