University of Virginia Law Professor James Ryan is attracting a lot of attention with his new book, “Five Miles Away, a World Apart,” which looks at the issue of school desegregation through the prism of two schools divided by a municipal boundary: predominantly white Douglas Southall Freeman High School in Henrico County and predominantly black Thomas Jefferson (Tee Jay) High School in the City of Richmond. “The line that separates Tee-Jay and Freeman,” he writes, “represents the most important boundary in public education: the boundary between city and suburban schools.”
A former law clerk for Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist, Ryan is not easily pigeonholed ideologically. He is deeply concerned about the inequities created by unequal educational opportunity, believes in an integrated society… and supports vouchers as a means of empowering parents with school choice. He concludes that a lack of money is not what ails inner-city schools — they often are better funded. What low-income students need is to rub elbows with their more affluent peers on the theory that they will absorb the middle-class ethos of higher expectations, parental involvement and harder academic application that leads to educational achievement.
Richard Kahlenburg, a senior fellow with the Century Foundation, writes a mostly positive review for the New Republic. Amy L. Wax, a University of Pennsylvania law professor, writes a mostly critical review for the Hoover Institution. I haven’t read the book so I can’t comment upon it. Although the book was written for a national audience, I live in the Freeman school district. I also suffer from the historical amnesia — how, exactly, did things get this way? — that most afflicts most Richmonders. Hopefully, I’ll get around to reporting back on this book.
— JAB
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