Education is The Best Affirmative Action

Thursday, July 30, 1998 - Seattle Times

by Bob Dorse
Special to The Times

THE opponents of Initiative 200, including The Seattle Times, miss the key element of affirmative action that is not affected by this initiative. That is the element of a better education for all disadvantaged youth in primary and secondary schools.

The first affirmative action that must occur is for disadvantaged youth to attend school, their neighborhood schools. The major cause of their lack of participation has been the failure of public schools to make them want to participate. Mandatory racial busing, a bad example of affirmative action, has also been a significant reason for the lack of minority student participation. Busing has caused a sense of stereotypical inferiority, rebellion and student absence. The tragic consequence has been a disproportionately high minority student dropout rate.

The second affirmative action that needs to occur is to raise the academic achievement level of disadvantaged youth up to the level of white and Asian students.

These actions are not easily achieved, as the record clearly shows. Parents and relatives of disadvantaged youth have grown impatient. This has been manifested for example, by the establishment of such fine private schools as Marva Collins' Westside Preparatory School in Chicago and Zion Preparatory Academy here in Seattle. It has also caused a call for educational vouchers for inner-city poor families, as mentioned in Walter Backstrom's (April 5) opinion article in The Times.

Significant improvement could be made in public schools by rewarding all school personnel who improve the academic level of disadvantaged students. Also, the fulfillment of Gov. Gary Locke's call for volunteers to tutor students who need help in reading is another major affirmative-action step that could be taken. Currently, I do this twice a week in Barbara Mann's special reading class at High Point Elementary School. It is a rewarding experience and, according to Mann, has improved the reading skills of her students.

Educational affirmative action is now actively practiced by the United States Army. In its endeavor to increase the diversity of its officer corps, the Army has established the United States Military Academy Prep School at Fort Monmouth, N.J. This school is exclusively for selected minority high-school students to help them gain admission to the West Point Military Academy.

These students, who would otherwise fail to meet West Point's entrance test requirements, experience a dramatic improvement in their academic achievement level and test on a par with any student. The school lasts for 10 months, stresses math and English and costs $40,000-$60,000 per student.

This academy, as commendable as it is, causes one to wonder why such remedial education is required at all. Why haven't public schools provided these students with the necessary academic skills to gain admission to West Point in the first place?

The affirmative action that all disadvantaged students need is an education that puts them into the mainstream of society without the quick fix of reverse discrimination.

Bob Dorse lives in Seattle

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Carl Gutiérrez-Jones
Department of English
University of California, Santa Barbara
e-mail: carlgj@humanitas.ucsb.edu