Cincinnati Schools Have Lawyers Looking at Ruling

Cincinnati Public Schools spokeswoman Janet Walsh said the school system’s attorneys were looking at the historic desegregation ruling issued Thursday by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The court rejected racial integration plans in Louisville and Seattle schools, saying they hadn’t used race as part of an overall educational plan, but the justices left the door open for the limited use of race to achieve diversity in schools

“We don’t know at the moment what impact this decision may have on Cincinnati schools,” she said.

Cincinnati did not have court-ordered busing as occurred in other areas.

The district, instead, reached a court-supervised settlement that ended a 1984 lawsuit. The agreement allowed the district to continue to operate magnet schools as an option for parents and a way to increase diversity in schools.

Now, neighborhood elementary schools are geographically based, but magnet schools, which also have specialty programs such as foreign languages or a Montessori teaching style or a critical thinking model, are designed to encourage a diverse student body. Race and gender are taken into account when filling the magnet school student population, said Walsh.

Virtually all of the district’s high schools are open to any student from across the district. The students list first, second and third preferences on high school applications and are assigned by computer with no consideration for race or gender.

The School for Creative and Performing Arts and some special programs have entrance requirements, but race is not a consideration.

“It’s premature to speculate how this decision will affect us,” Walsh said.

In Covington, Superintendent Jack Moreland says he believes the way Covington assigns students to schools is in line with the decision.

“Five or six years ago, we did redistricting here and, as I read it, what we did is exactly what the Supreme Court said is the right thing to do,” said Moreland.

“We made diversity an issue, but it wasn’t the only issue and it wasn’t even the primary issue. We wanted elementary schools to be of a certain size with a diverse population and a significant number of at-risk students (from poor families) at each school.

“I feel pretty good that what the Supreme Court said today (Thursday) was what we did five or six years ago. Based on what I read, it looks like we are dead on with the court decision.”

Moreland said it was decided that each of the six Covington elementary schools would have at least 15 percent minority students but no more than 50 percent

“We have a fairly broad range there and we try to follow that every year,” he said. “We had no data to support that range, but that’s what we used.

“We felt like it was important for our youngsters to go to schools with a diverse population. We wanted the schools to reflect the community.”

Only elementary schools are included in the plan because the Covington public school system has only one middle school and one high school.

Besides racial diversity, Covington tries to balance its elementary schools in terms of the number of students and the percentage of students from poor families.

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