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The New White Flight
One of our local school districts made the front page of the New York Times this past weekend, in a story titled District Eases Pressure on Students, Baring an Ethnic Divide. In a nutshell, the West Windsor-Plainsboro (WW-P) school district is implementing policies such as eliminating mid-terms and finals at the high school level, and making it easier for students to earn a seat in the district’s orchestra program. These measures are being taken in response to concerns by school counselors and parents that the district’s hyper-competitive academic program is putting students at risk for anxiety and depression.
I should qualify that last sentence. It’s not all parents that are concerned. Predominantly, it’s the white ones. WW-P, as it’s known, is about 65% Asian and growing. As the Times article points out, most WW-P Asian parents are just fine with the current level of rigor.
I was aware of the issue because the WW-P district is close to ours. Plus, my husband occasionally works co-counsel with an Indian-American attorney with kids enrolled in WW-P. He reported that whites are exiting the district in droves because it’s just “too competitive.”
White liberals fleeing because of demographics (and I’m assuming they’re liberal because this is New Jersey, after all)? Whatever happened to “celebrate diversity”?
All kidding aside, I think efforts like eliminating mid-terms/finals and letting the “squeakers” play in the orchestra are both wrong-headed and futile. “The district” isn’t demanding any kids get straight A’s. “The district” isn’t demanding any kids take a full load of AP courses, plus summer classes at the community college. Parents are doing that, and lowering the bar isn’t going to make them push their kids any less harder to succeed. Besides, shouldn’t high schoolers take mid-terms and finals to prep them for college And shouldn’t the orchestra seat go to the kid who takes private music lessons and practices three hours a night? (as opposed to my kid, who quickly tired of practicing and managed to make the flute sound like a dying squirrel?)
This isn’t to say the school district doesn’t have a point. The school counselors noted an uptick in student referrals for mental health evaluations, student surveys show a high degree of stress (especially at the high school level), and no one wants a repeat of the teen suicides that occurred in Palo Alto, California and Newton, Massachussets.
Still, I think WW-P is taking a clumsy, top-down approach to issues that are rooted in family and culture. These are also issues without a one-size-fits-all solution. A lot of Asian immigrants are moving to our own school district. My son and daughter have become friends with first-generation Chinese kids whose parents set extremely high standards. After school, it’s straight to Kumon Learning Center and then the cello before hitting the books. Some of them are by all accounts happy, well-adjusted and thriving; others burst into tears if they get anything less than a 90 on a test. It all depends on the kid.
My suspicion is that WW-P is motivated by blowback from parents, angry to learn that their child didn’t make the cut for the gifted-and-talented program or “Mathletes.” But what’s the school supposed to do? In a district full of academic and insanely hard-working kids, them’s the breaks. Either the school lowers its standards… or you’d better get moving.
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This is so sad, PLJ. I think too many parents are “living through their kids” and are forgetting that the real world has competition and stresses. Rather than dummy down the system, they should spend more time encouraging their kids to work hard, celebrate the successes they do have, and allow them to thrive. Regarding more kids seeking out mental help, we may not be able to know why. It could be that the parents are pushing them to get psychological help, hoping that will improve their performance; it could be the stress to over-perform from the parents; it could be that more kids don’t feel stigmatized going to a counselor or therapist. It could be for any number of reasons. It’s probably the parents who need the therapy.
I remember stress around mid term and final time in High School. Since when is that a condition a student is supposed to avoid? Stress conditions are part of life.
What a false world we create for our children. It is almost as if we wanted them to fail…
A great post, very interesting. And saddening. But I couldn’t help laughing out loud at “dying squirrel”! Hahaha!
Wow, what a shocking and depressing read. My thinking has always been that if an institution’s standards are higher than you’re used to, it is incumbent upon you to rise to the challenge.
Not anymore, Sparky! Don’t you realize by now that self-esteem, no matter how empty, is more important than scholarship?
I have no problem with helping kids handle stress. If counseling is necessary, I don’t think there is anything wrong with that.
Lowering standards is the wrong way to go. These high-achieving kids work their butts off and serve all of the praise they have earned.
If the white parents want their kids in less competitive schools, they can go elsewhere instead of bringing down the standards. No affirmative action for anyone regardless of race.
Parents paying for the Kumon Learning Center aren’t just setting high standards, but also offering their children the tools they need outside the classroom to achieve them.
I wonder if white parents see outside-of-the-classroom enrichment as less legitimate than Asian parents do.
I know my parents did – what was the point of living in an expensive school district, they though, if you still had to purchase outside-of-school instruction for your child?
At first, they felt this way even about music lessons: A child should not be expected to take private lessons in order to, say, play in the orchestra. It was the school’s job to offer all requisite music instruction (and, of course, the kid’s job to practice based solely on that instruction). Asking parents to shell out even more money for private lessons was immoral, they thought (“highway robbery” was, I believe, the phrase they used).
Personally, I think the Asian parents have a better grasp on reality: realistically, the job of a public school is to credential you, not necessarily to teach you. If the teachers actually teach, so much the better, of course! But relying solely on the teaching available in the classroom… it’s a bit naive, especially if you’re trying to raise an “overachieving” child (as my parents were).
Once again: school choice is the answer. Rather than look for a school district to accommodate you, have the freedom to find a school district that fits your needs.
p.s. we live next door to a school district that is lauded internationally for its school system. The vast majority of the students are Asian and attend another school after public school and all day Saturday. It’s always cracked me up that the public school system gets all the accolades for the academic achievements of their students with no mention of the after school/Saturday education most of their students benefit from.
p.p.s. Son #3 is the most gifted academically of our four but the least motivated. When he was in 3rd grade, for whatever reason, he was determined to be the first student to complete all his times tables. When he came home, he said “I did it. I was first. Even before (insert Asian girl’s name here). She goes to TWO schools. I barely go to one.”
Yep ;-)
“Public” schools have a tendency to restrict the supply of extracurricular activities and then ration the spots.
I suppose it’s for the best, as it prepares the kids for how their health care will be when they get older.
This is an interesting piece. I find it a bit humorous that it is the “Leftist” parents whose kids are being beaten like a drum academically and causing them to scream “no fair.” Perhaps if they would acknowledge the challenge of competition and stop trying to create a “safe space” out of their children’s public school, their children might be better prepared to face the adult world. Note to Leftist parents: You are doing it wrong.
That should be written on a plaque above the doors to every school:
“You are here to rise to our standards.”
I think they’re just as keen on the enrichment (myself included). The difference is, they let their child’s interest take the lead.
Over the years, my kids have participated in lessons for different instruments, tennis, fencing, camps for writing and coding . . . good Lord, I cringe at the money we’ve spent “enriching” them (in all honesty, it was more to keep them off the Nintendo/Playstation). But we never just put them in any lessons or programs. They asked or expressed an interest first.
My dear Indian friend took a different approach. She never asked her kids if they wanted to learn classical piano. She just started them with lessons at 5 and made them practice a ton, whether they liked it or not. She also hired them a math tutor from an early age, even though the kids were already doing great in math, so that they could get “ahead”. In no way did the kids want a tutor. But Mom said so and you don’t contradict Mom. That’s that.
I wish I could tell you her two teenagers are now messed up, but they’re charming and good natured as can be. And close to their mother!
Whites have a different mindset: we value individualism in our kids. And, for better or for worse, we want to be their friends.
Nothing wrong with individualism, but kids don’t know enough to be individuals. That’s part of what it means to be a child.
Sadly, sometimes I think we encourage children to do whatever they want and then regulate the tar out of adults.
Not me. The fact that my oldest (kidcoder) has become my friend has come as a total shocker. It is delightful, but entirely unexpected and unplanned.
We homeschool, using the Calvert curriculum and remote grading. One thing we love about it is that they do to hesitate to FAIL the kids when they earn it. Failing early really helps learn those basic hardcore lessons about life.
Indeed … Perfect example of the unobstructed assent of the entitlement culture.
Once upon a time, Jewish kids dominated their intellectual environment. That is no longer true: recent immigrants from cultures that value hard work and intellect are consistently better performers these days.
As expectations fall (and our notion of what constitutes a “successful” childhood continues to be watered down toward fuzzy notions of happiness, self-esteem and feelings), our kids are drawn in that direction.
For me, it connects back to whether we live our lives for accomplishments or our experiences: if we prioritize the latter, then competitive school is just not that important.
And as an FYI …. I have a passing familiarity with the WW-P high school music program. There are 2 high schools North and South and they each have several concert bands, and jazz bands. I’ve heard their top tier jazz band and they were excellent! Damn shame if they water it down.
Amen!
Having spent many years in Japan and South Korea, I’ve seen some of the negative effects of pushing students too hard to do well. However, having said this, I think it’s better for the schools to breed students that can succeed in a competitive environment. As a nation, we need people who learn the value of studying hard, because we need adults who are willing to work and apply themselves just as hard to succeed.
Almost as if it’s more genes than parenting…
I know, right?! There’s probably a genetic aspect to which kids can handle those kinds of demands and which struggle.
I’ve read that depression/anxiety is an issue within the Asian-American community, so the “Tiger Mom” approach certainly has some drawbacks. From my friend, I see that it requires constant vigilance and monitoring of your kids, on a level that I could never handle. And I do think it’s important for younger kids to have time to roam on their bikes, play with neighborhood kids, etc. Kids need to know how to survive unsupervised.
My oldest son said we were raising them “Asian” I took it as a compliment.
I think the Tiger Mom approach is deeply flawed and incredibly risky. Studies show that by the time kids are 30 their parent’s style has little to no effect (0-10%) on how happy and successful they are. What has a lot of effect (about 50%) is who their parents are and what genes they passed on. What you have a high impact on is your kid’s eventual opinion of their childhood and you as a parent. Here’s where the risk is involved because I don’t believe the number who are going to respond emotionally positively to Tiger Parenting is terribly high.
While it’s true if your kids are going to be world class musicians they need to work constantly from a young age, I think most of Tiger parenting is a waste of the parent’s (and kid’s) time. Better to improve your kid’s collective impact on the world by just having more kids, if that’s what’s important to you.
Anymore, I don’t really see the point of everyone being hyper-successful (by whatever metric) and hyper-competitive. I mean, some people are driven by those motivations and that’s good, but I don’t really believe it implies some sort of moral superiority to be born with such preferences. We need people of all types to experience optimal comparative advantage. It would be better for everyone to be comfortable with optimizing their own interests and potential rather than worrying how one stacks up compared to everyone else.
We could all save ourselves a lot of grief if we just went back to the way they used to do things in the 50s. Just teach the kids academics, leave the self-esteem and other extraneous drivel out, give them an F if they fail, have standards that everyone must rise to meet. All I know is that when I was in grade school, there was no such thing as and no need for Sylvan, Hooked on Phonics, or all the other extra outside teaching aids that suddenly sprang up after they messed with it.
Our parents didn’t push us into special summer sessions of math or anything else. Summer was a vast expanse of free play time stretching before us after school on the last day of the year. That free playtime was every bit as important to our development as any classroom subject. Let them be kids.
And all of those kids came of age in the 1960s.
Well not all of us took a left turn at Wellesley. It wasn’t their education that caused the social upheaval of the 1960s.
I understand. I’m just skeptical of the romance of the 1950s.
It’s not romance! I was there!
The decline of the West on one anecdote.
That’s just crazy enough to work.
I’m 46. I played outside unsupervised. We came home before dark. I ate dirt a few times. We made bicycle ramps with cinder blocks and plywood without consulting an engineer. We didn’t “hydrate”, we drank from a friend’s garden hose when we were thirsty. We said ‘please’ and ‘thank you’. We rode in cars that only had lap belts in the back. We ate and shared peanut butter and nobody died.