It’s an outcome that might make even George Wallace blush. To improve outcomes among minority students, some school districts have resorted to creating classes voluntarily segregated by race.
A recent Wall Street Journal article reported on the trend, which (unsurprisingly) has sprouted in leftist bastions like Seattle, Minneapolis, and San Francisco. But as with most left-wing ideas, this concept, however well-intentioned, seems destined to cause more problems than it solves.
‘Safe Spaces’
The Journal profiled the Evanston Township school district just outside Chicago. Every year, several hundred students sign up for optional “affinity” classes featuring only students of the same skin color, taught by a nonwhite teacher.
The program intends to improve minority student achievement at a time when African American and Hispanic student performance continues to lag on standardized tests. Both in Evanston and nationally, minority students also enroll in Advanced Placement classes — which provide high school students a preview of college-level courses — at lower rates than their white peers.
The Journal quoted one participant in an “affinity” class from 2021 as saying that the program increased feelings of acceptance: “I feel like I represent me and not the whole black race in this AP class. It’s a safe space. In AP classes that are mostly white, I feel like if I answer wrong, I am representing all black kids. I stay quiet in those classes.”
There is certainly value in having a diverse cohort of teachers so that students of all skin colors and backgrounds can
