It feels as though every few weeks another disturbing development limps out of the sink of inefficiency and poor decisions that is the Wake County (NC) Public Schools. The topic of today's episode? The school board has found that--wait for it--kids still want to transfer from their impoverished and underperforming neighborhood schools to their oftentimes-superior magnet brethren. In response to this sensible would-be exodus, the board is again contemplating methods by which to stem the tide and keep the neediest pupils stuck in their present redoubts of mediocrity. So what's this all about? Garrulous school board member Lori Millberg explains thusly: "[Letting students transfer] doesn't help to reduce concentrations of poverty in magnet schools if it increases the concentration in other schools." So, we should keep them there, instead? At this point in Wake's long and tortured obsession with race and class quotas, Gadfly is beginning to feel like a broken record. But one thing's for sure: that there are still parents putting up with these shenanigans is a doggone miracle.
"Wake may tweak magnet school criteria," by T. Keung Hui, Newsobserver.com, November 3, 2008