The fatal flaw in immersive charter schools, and a modest solution

In the continuing thread on the planned $100 million “Taj Mahal” school in Harlem where pupils will spend their entire day and evening being provided with a host of services and only go home to sleep, Alex K. writes:

The plan to take black kids away from their own culture and immerse them in a Taj Mahal academic environment for the entire day is missing one key element: the peer group. Peers are the most important influence on a person, so as long as the black kids are with each other in the Taj Mahal they will not be getting the transformative environmental experience that the Taj is intended to provide.

The only solution, the ultimate solution, is to provide each black student with an entire positive peer group of his own.

We need an entire school of white students for each black kid.

Of course, that will require more white kids. So a politically correct, pro-minority excuse for higher white fertility!

I’ve replied to Alex in the thread.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 19, 2011 08:30 AM | Send