Ithaca City Schools “Have Not Come Clean as to Their Past Practices” Segregating Students
“We’re satisfied that they opened the event. We’re not satisfied because they have not come clean as to their past practices, and they really need to do that.”
I appeared on the Stuart Varney show on Fox Business this morning to talk about the Equal Protection Project challenge against segregationist practices at the Ithaca City School District. For background on the controversy, see these posts:
- Ithaca (NY) Public Schools Must Desegregate “Students of Color” Summit, Demands Equal Protection Project
- Ithaca (NY) Schools Superintendent Says Students Of Color Summit “Open To Everyone” – Reacting To Equal Protection Project Demand
- After Equal Protection Project Effort, Ithaca Schools Apologize For “Exclusionary Language” Barring White Students From Event
We also touched upon what I expect to see in the fall regarding anti-Israel campus protests and the state of free speech on campuses.
Transcript (auto-generated, may contain transcription errors)
Varney: A New York State School district is apologizing for using exclusionary language to promote a students of color event. The apology came after an anti-affirmative action group accused the District of segregating students. Cornell Law Professor William Jacobson joins me now. Is it plain and simple segregation, William?
Jacobson: Well, yes it is. And it’s pretty shocking. I mean, we just celebrated the 70th anniversary of Brown versus Board of Education, which eliminated segregation in public schools. And we found out at Equal Protection Project that Ithaca City Schools, which is where Cornell University is located, were having events and whites were excluded. The language was for only students of color. And in fact, there was an internal email sent saying that quote, unquote, allies are not welcome, allies being, uh, whites basically. And so we wrote a demand letter to the school district. We insisted that they stop this practice. They denied the practice even though we had the evidence, but we also insisted that they apologize and inform the community that it’s open. And they did that. They sent a mass email apologizing.
Varney: So you are satisfied with this?
Jacobson: Well, so far. We have a Freedom of Information Act request into the district to find out more what’s been going on. We have very strong information that this has been going on for several years, although the school district has denied it. But we think that’s true, and so we’re gonna keep digging. And so we’re satisfied that they opened the event. We’re not satisfied because they have not come clean as to their past practices, and they really need to do that.
Varney: We saw a lot of anti-Israel protests on college campuses at the end of the semester. Most of the students are now home for the summer. Got that. Is that the only reason protests have settled down? The kids have gone home?
Jacobson: I think it is. I think that when we get back at the end of August or mid-August, depending when the school starts at a particular university, we’re gonna see intensified protests. We think they’re organizing over the summer. They’ve already increased the aggressiveness of their language. I think we’re gonna see everything that happened this past eight months on steroids, on campuses. They’re gonna be confrontational, and I think there’s gonna be violence.
Varney: Harvard says they won’t take a position on issues that don’t have to do with their school. Will that help on campus tensions?
Jacobson: I don’t think so. It’s too little, too late. They’ve, for decades, taken positions. The faculty is a monoculture to the left. There is no diversity of viewpoint left on campuses. So it’s nice all of the sudden, after all of this has been done to academia to announce you’re gonna be neutral. They should have been neutral 20 years ago. I don’t think right now it’s going to make a difference.
Varney: You are a, a free speech guy. Would free speech be making a comeback? Can you say that? Have you turned the tide?
Jacobson: I don’t think so. I think that there are instances where it has has, but I think the college culture in general is repressive. But there has been some progress made. I’m not going to say there’s no progress, but people are getting fed up. Students are getting fed up with having their voices censored and silenced and harassed. And I think the, what’s happening now with the anti-Israel protest is putting this into focus because all of the sudden administrations have discovered free speech that for all of these years when they monitored free speech and suppressed it. But now if you want to chant against Israel and do things against Israel, they say it’s free speech. So it’s a strange situation on campuses.
Varney: It sure is. Thanks William. We appreciate you being with us. William Jacobson, thanks for being here. See you soon. I hope. Now this.
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Comments
It’s time, and past time, to cut off government funding to these indoctrination centers. Let them survive on their own merits – if they have any.
Sorry, can’t be done in this case. 1. ICSD has its own taxing authority. 2. If it falls short the government is required by law to fund it. Changing both of these things would require amending the state constitution by referendum. The teachers’ unions would pull out all stops to defeat that.
Ithaca City Schools are being run by documented racists who blame all their problems in life on white people. They must resign.
I wish someone would end Qualified and Sovereign Immunity.
This protects the INDIVIDUALS from responsibility for violating law.
It was not enumerated in the Constitution and was not passed by Congress. It is bad law created by SCOTUS just like Roe was.
It needs to die like Roe in the Courts or be moderated by a new law from Congress.
The states’ sovereign immunity is in the constitution: the Eleventh Amendment.
The USA’s sovereign immunity isn’t explicitly in there, but it’s part of the pre-constitutional law which is the background against which the constitution was made. (As was state sovereign immunity, which is why it wasn’t explicitly stated, and as soon as the Supreme Court denied it the states immediately amended the constitution to correct the Court.)
Peabody here. Let’s step into the Wayback Machine, to 1955. How many Ithicans demonstrated against the south’s segregated schools?
I have mixed feelings about this, there were people who wanted to stop blacks who had merit from achieving any sort of success. That was wrong.
As a practical matter, school integration did not help most blacks, it id not help most blacks, while degrading quality of education for all other students. Most of my family are teachers, I was the rouge who went into business. My father started in the mid 50s, from 1970 or so, the last 15 years were mind numbing, when he started the school system he was in was one of the best in the country, by the 80s it was one of the worst, all black. Teachers derive joy from working with students who want to learn, those students did not.
when lefty segregates its for a good reason they demand us to believe
anyone else is b/c they are racist they demand us to believe
stop the flow of tax money 99% of these problems go away
“When people get used to preferential treatment, equal treatment seems like discrimination.”
— Thomas Sowell, PhD
azquotes.com