Disparity in the treatment of minority students in the School District came to the forefront in a local community forum.
The Johnson County Disproportionate Minority Contact Committee held a community forum at the Iowa City Public Library on Thursday evening to address the effect of racial injustice on youth.
The discussion featured speakers from the Iowa City School District Equity Research Project, Assistant County Attorney Pat Weir, and a panel of local high-school students and alumni.
The high-school students and alumni shed light on the mistreatment of African-American students and shared their own experiences of inequality.
“I wanted to write poetry,” said high-school student Calvin Sandifer. “But people in the school didn’t care about my interests except for sports.”
High-school alumna Anna Lobo said that in school, people often didn’t have the same expectations of her compared with her peers because of her skin color.
“We need to jump through hoops two times the number as white people to get the same opportunities,” she said.
Students also discussed the difficulty they experience trying to overcome the disparity in Iowa City.
By creating a survey that was sent out to sixth-, eighth, and 11th-graders in the district earlier this year, researchers said, the Equity Research Project were able to demonstrate the feelings of inequality among high-school students through statistics.
Around 2,400 students, 88 percent of the three different age groups, in the School District answered the survey.
During the forum, researchers said students could express their perception of school-related topics with options to respond with strongly disagree, disagree, agree and strongly agree.
Additionally, topic of the questions were related to feelings of social belonging, relationship with teachers, classroom inclusivity, and negative experiences in school.
The discussion also reveal that black students were the least likely to report a sense of belonging, with fully 29 percent indicating that they disagree or strongly disagree that they feel it.
When students were asked if they believed their teachers “understand where they’re coming from,” 70 percent of white students agreed while only 56 percent of black students agreed.
The researchers also displayed data collected on school achievements and the disciplinary action of the school.
“Black students are 17 percent of the school population, but make up 62 percent of out of school suspensions,” said UI Assistant Professor Sarah Bruch, the director of social and education policy program at the Public Policy Center.
Bruch said the disparity of achievement among different races, using the data, and noted that there is a large disparity of achievements in the department of math.
Data also showed that Asian students achieved extremely well and white students performed at almost the same level as Asians. However, the achievements of black students were troublingly low, Bruch said.
School District Director of Equity and Staffing Kingsley Botchway said the survey is important to develop strategic goals around equity in reading, math, and the environment of the classroom.
“The data collected brought the discussion to the forefront of the needs of the district,” Botchway said.
Although important for minimizing disparity, he said he believes more action is needed to achieve equality.
“The survey reflects the students’ voices, but there is a need for the teachers’ voices,” he said. “There is a need for administrators’ voices. We need to communicate with everyone.”