Magnet schools key to educational equality
The question of education equality across Connecticut districts is a fraught one. While there are unquestionably advantages to attending a well-resourced, highperforming school, there are great educators across the state. Even in the most disadvantaged districts, there are teachers and administrators doing important work against long odds, and still achieving great things.
It’s not right to talk about “failing” school districts. There are countless success stories from such schools every year, and those wins need to be highlighted.
All that said, there are unquestionably inequalities between schools, sometimes only a few miles away from each other. With a funding system based in large measure on property taxes, and with cities dealing with a decades-long flight of their tax base to other places, the gaps have been filled in, to some extent, with state money. But there’s no question it’s not enough, and funding shortfalls persist.
In addition, the concentration of poverty in a small number of urban districts means that children with the most needs are often overrepresented in a minority of schools. That puts even more pressure on those teachers and administrators, and if test scores suffer as a result, no one should be surprised.
The state has for decades discussed remedies to these circumstances, with varying degrees of success. Without question, a major hindrance has been reluctance on the part of suburbanites to take steps they think could negatively impact their own school experience. People pay good money to live in towns with “good schools,” and they don’t want to take any chances.
So, while any hope of integration across district lines is met with fierce resistance, as evidenced by an outcry over an abortive plan to combine backoffice functions between towns early in Gov. Ned Lamont’s term, there are other methods on which greater policy focus is needed. That includes magnet schools.
Magnet schools combine enrollments from across districts often with a specific curricular focus. Today, there are more than 4,000 public magnet schools nationwide serving about 3.5 million students in more than 600 districts.
Sen. Chris Murphy and Second District U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, both Democrats, are sponsoring a bill to expand support for magnet schools as well as to “expand on the original mission of ensuring magnet schools provide their communities with educational opportunities that promote diversity and academic excellence.”
There has also been movement on the state level as the General Assembly looks to finalize agreement to the four-decade-old Sheff vs. O’Neill lawsuit that led to the expansion of magnet schools in the Hartford area as a means of desegregating districts. While those new schools have seen some success, there’s still far more to be done to ensure that everyone has access to the highest-quality education.
And there are still major obstacles. Another outcome of Sheff was the Open Choice program, where the state would largely pay for children in urban districts to attend neighboring suburban schools. This year, though, we’ve seen suburbs uninterested in taking part, even though it would cost them little and provide a real benefit for their own students.
The job of ensuring an equal education for all students is never over. Increasing access to magnet schools is an important step. But it’s only a step.
It’s not right to talk about “failing” school districts. There are countless success stories from such schools every year, and those wins need to be highlighted.