鈥淸W]e are learning about the process by which racial, ethnic, and economic segregation is reproduced and legitimized by a hierarchical understanding of different races and cultures in our society,鈥� writes Amy Start Wells, Professor of Sociology and Education, in , in Education Week. "This racial hierarchy, which is often vehemently denied by many who perpetuate it, fosters implicit racial biases that shape the choices of educators, parents, and home buyers.鈥�
In her piece, "," Wells, a reknowned scholar of racial segregation in public schools who is also President of the American Educational Research Association and Director of 麻豆原创's Reimagining Education Summer Institute, praises programs such as the 鈥溾�� initiative in San Antonio, which controls school assignments so that half of the students come from outside the neighborhood, or so preference is made for students within a 2.5-mile radius that includes both public housing and million-dollar homes. Wells calls this a 鈥渂old approach to targeting concentrated poverty and segregation 鈥� two key predictors of low student achievement 鈥� in public schools.鈥�
Amy Stuart Wells, Professor of Sociology and Education
But to achieve true equity of opportunity and success in America's schools, educators, administrators and policymakers also need to dig deeper, she writes. They need to question how their assumptions about 鈥渞ace, ethnicity, and culture shape the way we define 'good' students, schools, and communities鈥� and perpetuate stereotypes that 鈥渄oom certain schools and students to 鈥榝ailure.鈥樷��
Wells writes that 鈥渢he ethnic studies movement in the Southwest and the culturally relevant pedagogy movement in the Northeast are ... beginning to address these issues. However, true integration may be elusive without this reexamination.鈥�
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This year's Reimagining Education: Teaching and Learning in Racially Diverse Schools will be held July 15-19, 2019.