Integrating schools peaked here in the late 80s. The problem is that busing actually worked. Two board members represent District 1 (blue), four represent District 2 (green), and three members are elected at large and represent the entire county. “You have people make choices to go places instead of making them.” Forsyth County is divided into two voting districts. “You achieve integration by choice,” he says. “And there was clearly a sentiment of, you know, we need to return to neighborhood schools.”įive of the nine incumbent school board members lost their seats that year, ushering in a mandate to draw a new student assignment plan. “The letters to the editor were voluminous,” says Martin. Busing was out, and “school choice” was in. That's when black students took school buses to majority-white schools, and white students to majority-black schools to desegregate them. Retired Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Superintendent Don Martin arrived in the early 90s, towards the end of Supreme Court-mandated busing. The district split in two - one primarily urban, and the other encompassing rural areas as well - opening the door for African-American representation on the board.īut the challenges of overcoming decades of resistance on the part of local parents and administrators remained. That began to change in 1990 when the city was court-ordered to fix it. The majority of school district lines here were drawn more than 20 years ago and approved by mostly all-white school boards elected through a system deeply rooted in racial discrimination. “If, for example, we have a school that is in an area that by those logistics we can't capture exactly what we want out of it, we can pair it in a zone with other schools in hopes that with a choice plan, there could be a little bit more balancing happening there based on the factors that are decided at the time,” says Atashbar. Thankfully, he says, parents have what's called “controlled choice.” Not happy with your nearby residential school? You're guaranteed enrollment at one of three other schools within your zone. He says before assigning students to new schools, they study a host of factors - from equal access to transportation and capacity issues to third-grade reading scores - but blending logistics, ideology, and philosophy can be tricky. Homan Atashbar is the Director of Student Assignment for Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools. He says his software generates massive amounts of geographic data from a bird's-eye view all the way down to the ground level, where each student lives in relation to their zone. It's covered with a multilayered map of every street in the county, middle school district boundaries, and more.Ītashbar is the Director of Student Assignment for Winston-Salem/Forsyth County (WSFC) Schools. On the northern outskirts of the city, in a small administration office, Homan Atashbar scans a large computer screen. So, how does our system even work here?”Īs WFDD's David Ford discovered, the answers are complicated and steeped in history. She asks, “How did the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Board of Education evolve? I can't find the logic in the two districts, which are racially divided, and I've just noticed how schools are segregated. This week WFDD listener Emily Schutt takes us back to school to cover an issue on the minds of many: our education system.
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