Prestigious NYC independent school ends policy that grouped students by race

'I think that it is essential to note that our groupings were not created to take away rights or opportunities from anyone, but rather to create the most supportive environment possible for all students, which is the very heart of our mission'

Corbis Stock Image/ Empty Classroom (Wikipedia)

A prestigious independent school in New York City that has ended its policy of grouping students together by race for part of the day, says it intended to provide support for its pupils of colour.

The Little Red School House (LREI), located in Manhattan’s West Village neighbourhood, in 2017 instituted a policy that kept students of similar identities together for so-called homeroom, a common area where students spend many hours of non-lesson time.

But the school’s strategy caused a stir among some parents. A New York Post article published last month, highlighted reactions to the school’s policy; some parents reportedly deemed the policy as a form of segregation.

“My daughter who is 11 was like, ‘Wow, this is crazy. They are talking about separating by colour,’” one father told the newspaper. “And I was thinking how antiquated is this? This is backwards. It’s almost like segregation now.”

But the administration at Little Red School House says the class placement policy was motivated by efforts to support students of colour – not segregation.

In a statement emailed to The Independent, Phil Kassen, director of LREI, said the school implemented the policy in two grades in its lower and middle school for the 2017/2018 school year.

“In the 2017/18 school year, in an attempt to better support our students of colour, we implemented this policy in two grades in a way that placed greater emphasis on race for part of the school day,” Mr Kassen wrote.

LREI labels itself as a progressive school teaching students from preschool through high school. The independent school, with $45,485 tuition per year, reportedly attracts numerous children of celebrities, like David Schwimmer, Christy Turlington Burns and Sofia Coppola, the Post reported. Each grade level reportedly has roughly 40 students and two homerooms.

The school’s mission statement states in part that it’s a “progressive programme” that’s “rooted in a fundamental love of learning and a connection to the real world”.

While some parents and commenters on social media have taken issue with the school’s class placement policy that emphasised race, one parent of former students of the school told NBC News that she applauded the school’s efforts to provide a nurturing environment for students of colour.

Nichole Thompson-Adams, who is black, told NBC News that her daughter, Sage Adams, had benefited from the school’s efforts to emphasise diversity and to encourage students to get involved in civil rights matters. She added that she appreciated the school’s efforts to not be “colour blind.”

Sage Adams, a creative director that’s worked with R&B star SZA, wrote an impassioned letter in support of LREI in a caption on Instagram. Ms Adams shared the importance of grouping black students and other students of colour together, as opposed to “sprinkling them around white classrooms”.

“When you drop a bunch of brown kids in an all white environment they NEED [each other],” Ms Adams wrote.

The Independent received a copy of an e-mail Mr Kassen sent to parents. In the letter, which Mr Kassen addressed the class placement controversy by claiming the school considered multiple factors in the decision process to split students up among different homerooms. The director noted gender, academic strengths and past and current friendships as factors. Mr Kassen also emphasised its intention to provide students the opportunity to be with “other children like themselves".

“It is clear that we have an obligation to put all our children in a position where they can learn from as many different kinds of people as possible and absorb many different points of view,” Mr Kassen wrote.

“It is also clear that we should do everything possible to encourage growth in personal identity and self-confidence. Research shows that such growth is enhanced by children being with, and being validated by, teachers and students like themselves – no problem, of course, for the majority of our students, but potentially a large one for those who do not have this sometimes unrecognised advantage…”

Mr Kassen also said students spent about 30 percent of their days in homeroom and that all students of colour were placed in either the same homeroom or one of two homerooms in each grade level that was impacted by the policy.

“These are complex issues and conversations. I think that it is essential to note that our groupings were not created to take away rights or opportunities from anyone, but rather to create the most supportive environment possible for all students, which is the very heart of our mission.”

LREI will not be implementing this policy in the coming school year.

Outrage the school’s policy stems from general concerns that the US still struggles with separate and unequal schooling – particularly for public schools – since the landmark 1954 US Supreme Court ruling Brown V Board of Education, that was supposed to end the segregation in education.