A Point of View

Gwendolyn Grant
President & CEO
Urban League of Greater Kansas City
Friday, July 27, 2007

Free At Last!

Free at last, free at last. Thank God almighty, we finally have an opportunity to wrest educational control of our children from the benighted.

Thanks to a law that takes effect this summer, residents of the Kansas City, Missouri and Independence School Districts may have an opportunity [in November] to vote on a proposition that would allow the portion of the Kansas City, Missouri School District (KCMSD) that is east of I-435 to be annexed by the Independence School District.

If both districts approve, the annexation proceeds. If both districts or the receiving district (in this case Independence) votes no, the status quo is maintained. However, if the KCMSD votes no and Independence votes yes, the annexation will proceed because the KCMSD is unaccredited. Demographically the area, which primarily consists of northwestern Independence and Sugar Creek, is overwhelmingly white. Because such a small percentage of the school-age children who reside in those neighborhoods attend public schools, the KCMSD has to bus kids from predominately black central city neighborhoods to keep the schools open.

According to available data, it costs the district more to operate the schools east of I-435 than is generated from the area’s depressed tax base.

I support the proposition. Residents of Northern Independence and Sugar Creek should have an opportunity to join a school district they believe will provide their children a quality education. Moreover, it is foolish and irresponsible for the KCMSD to close schools in black neighborhoods and spend millions to bus blacks to Independence and Sugar Creek.

But more important, for the first time, the KCMSD will, in all likelihood, become a majority black district in both school and voting population.

Currently, the KCMSD is governed by a nine-member board. Three Board members are elected at-large and one from each of six sub-districts. Three of the six sub-districts are predominately white and three are predominately black.

If the annexation is approved, there will be a reapportionment that should result in two predominately white sub-districts and four predominately black sub-districts. Customarily, only one of the three at-large Board members has been black. After the annexation, the African American community will have an excellent opportunity to elect at least two and maybe three blacks at-large.

If these changes take effect, African Americans in Kansas City will be able to elect a majority of the school board and thereafter, control the educational destiny of our youth. Although blacks in leadership positions on the school board is not a panacea for black children, it is time for African Americans to govern this dysfunctional school district.

The KCMSD has had a majority black student population for nearly 40 years. During that period, majority white and often racially divided school boards have presided over a system with high drop out rates and low achievement levels. These miseducated students beget miseducated children who become pathological adults perpetuating cycles of poverty and ignorance. The community suffers.

A board elected by a majority black populace can do no worse. And, in the words of a great African statesman: “It is far better to be free to govern or misgovern yourself than to be governed by anybody else.”