D.C. government does not require schools to educate black students as well as white students according to a complaint submitted to the U.S. Department of Education by a D.C. resident.

Note from the editor:

This complaint was submitted just two days before the release of the Supreme Court’s decision on Affirmative Action admissions to universities. The author of this complaint, Jeff Schmidt, is a long-time DC resident and father of a student who graduated from DC public schools and then went on to graduate from college. Schmidt is a boomer, cisgender, white man, with a PhD in physics from the University of California, Irvine, who takes an active volunteer role in assisting DC public school science and math teachers in creating better curriculum.

It’s entirely possible for a student to get a good education in the DC public school system but it’s no easy task.  According to the NCES’s National Report Card, only 17% of DCPS 8th graders are proficient at math.

After reading DC’s Education ESSA Plan, he sent the following letter of complaint to the US Department of Education.  In it, he asks that they consider applying the same standards used in schools and classrooms with significant numbers of white students to every school and each student. Why don’t we do that?  Why should we accept year in and year out that Black kids and white kids won’t be treated equally?  Long after Brown v Board of Education, racism in DC public schools continues to be baked into the system.