Suzie Henning: You can do better, SPS, and you should
By Suzie Henning
The core value printed on Spokane Public Schools materials states that they provide “excellence for everyone.” But to do so, you must design with equity in mind first and questions of transportation, overpopulation and other logistics second. The only way to advance equity in an unjust system is to foster it as the guiding principle of everything policy.
A review of the materials on the committee process, district publications and recent media reports clearly convey that three central factors were of primary importance to the Spokane School Board in determining the new boundaries: (1) the advancement of a cohort model and the resolution of issues related to (2) population and (3) transportation. The logistical concerns shared for boundary change are real, but these are not the primary questions to guide public systems charged to do better in designing anti-racist and equitable policies to counter the oppressive models of the past and the opportunity gap of the present.
In Spokane, we must do better. We cannot intentionally design a school boundary system that produces what civil and educational advocates have challenged for 75 years. I question the use of the cohort model guiding this process. Do we really want a cohort of white kids over there; a cohort of rich kids in the south; a cohort of Black kids all in one school cafeteria? When we design systems that congregate the poor or marginalized into one setting, which is what is being proposed, we don’t call it a neighborhood cohort, we call it what it is, segregation.
Is sending the poorest kindergartners to the poorest elementary schools to then attend the poorest middle schools just to (fingers-crossed) graduate from the poorest high schools doing anything less? The cohort model benefits those who already have privilege and further disadvantages the rest.
We create what Johnathan Kozol, in 1991, described as “savage inequalities” in public education. Make no mistake, these boundaries are reproducing savage inequalities by perpetuating the sociopolitical and socioeconomic divisions already present in our city. The research from the last 40 years on educational equity policy challenges what has been shared by the district; these boundaries PROMOTE injustice and INTRODUCE inequalities in favor of “solving” logistical issues related to transportation and population growth. School choice does not correct this problem; it does not even address this problem.
Instead, we must practice what Chardin and Novak (2021) describe as “equity by design” and begin our discussions with how we can promote a more just and equitable public system for all learners. The National Equity Project (2021) reminds us that leadership means taking responsibility for what matters to you.
This is a moment to decide who we are as a district and work to achieve greater equality and equity, not segregate based on economic and racial divides.
This week (June 14), a discussion of school quality was introduced by the School Board. I absolutely agree that it is possible to have high quality schools with any population of students.
We know what this involves. Schools with high numbers of students on free and reduced lunch require more human resources and student support, more learning partnerships with families and local agencies, food insecurity assistance, more experienced teachers, and increased per pupil expenditures, just to be on an even playing field with their wealthier counterparts. Yet these schools are often not recipients of additional aid and struggle to retain qualified staff. Where is this discussed in the boundary plan? Where are the equity action steps to mitigate the consequences of these boundaries?
While a quality school is possible, it is not clear that the boundaries proposal has a plan to develop quality schools and it is not at all clear why we would DESIGN a system that intentionally requires such a plan.
I call upon the school board to remember its core values to provide excellence for everyone by holding true to the equity resolution approved one year ago. Words matter. And the board’s equity pledge is significant. But words without aligned action are hollow.
This boundary discussion is a practical manifestation of the Board’s core values. If you pursue these boundaries, what is your equity action plan to support the schools you are creating? The school board will communicate what matters to it with this decision. And the future of our city depends on whether they will actively put equity first.
Suzie Henning, Ed.D., is an assistant professor of education and a Spokane Public Schools parent.