Dear Editor,  

I am a tenth grade student at Waltham  High School and a participant in the  Brandeis Upward Bound Program. Upward  Bound is a program that is a great oppor tunity for first generation students who  want to go to college. As a part of the larger  Brandeis and Waltham community, I am  writing about an issue that impacts all  of us: segregation in the Waltham public  schools based on income, which has result ed in huge disparities in race and funding  between schools. This means that students  of color in Waltham attend schools with  lower funding than their white counter parts. Our students are being discrimi nated against because of their financial  status, which also affects their education.  Comparing both Kennedy and McDevitt  Middle Schools, there is an exterior differ ence as well as an interior difference. 

Firstly, our schools are so noticeably  different because household incomes  drastically segregate kids by ethnicity in  Waltham. In Waltham, the neighborhoods  with the highest incomes are Pigeon Hill,  Piety Corner, Jericho Hill, and others.  According to bestneighborhood.org and  Waltham’s District Profile, the house holds with the most income are almost  all located near Kennedy Middle. These  neighborhoods are also where there is a  higher white population. Kennedy Mid dle School’s ethnic population is mostly  white which is 47.3% of the student body,  while the other largest group is Hispanic,  at 34.1% of the school population. McDe vitt Middle School, on the other hand, has  an average low income as shown in the  school as well as the community around  the school. The average income that is  around the school is mostly low with some  average-income neighborhoods as seen in  bestneigborhood.org. On the Waltham’s  District Profile, McDevitt has a greater  Hispanic population, making up 61.9% of  the school. Kennedy has almost twice the  white population that Mcdevitt does, and  about half the amount of Hispanic stu dents. This large white population follows  income statistics in the area. These sta tistics as well as income households show  why and how these schools are segregated  because of income. 

Children in Waltham are segregated  based on race before they even start school.  This results in a gap in opportunities for  students. Considering the options between  the Kennedy Middle Schools Page of extra curricular activities, we see that KMS has  20 activities which include six sports. Con sidering the financial status of the school  the amount of afterschool activities is logi cal on the amount of opportunities for the  students. On the Mcdevitt Middle Schools page, there are 16 activities including  four sports. Knowing that this school is of  lower income, the amount of afterschool  activities, especially sports, gives a clear  understanding of how both buildings are  treated and how they affect our students.  Both of these sources show how different  both schools are compared to each other,  which affects the school’s community, but  most importantly, the students.   

MMS and KMS aren’t the only schools  affected by this segregation. In Spring field, MA in 2010-2011, public schools en rollment had decreased at the same time  that Hispanic enrollment increased. These students were low income as well as mi norities in, “intensely segregated schools,  indicating that Springfield’s students are  segregated by race and class; the share  of low-income students in intensely seg regated schools increased from 75.2% in  1999-2000 to 89.9% in 2010-2011” from The Civil Rights Project. Students of color have  been in segregated schools for over two de cades. As the numbers of students of color  increased in enrollment, white students  had started to decrease in public school  enrollment. Continuing, not only did par ents and the community around the school  stop enrolling in the schools, but buses  in Boston started segregating students by  color in 1974. There had been many pro tests and Massachusetts passed a Racial  Imbalance Act “To address longstanding  segregation”. The Act required districts to  bus white students to predominantly Black  schools and Black students to predomi nantly white schools. This program was  met with widespread outrage, and has not  done enough to address the problem of ra cial segregation in Massachusetts schools.  Waltham is part of the rule, not the exception.

In conclusion, Kennedy Middle School  and Mcdevitt Middle School are segregated  by income but also as statistics show, by  race as well. Our students are affected by  this since they are not getting the proper  resources they need. Students’ educa tion is most important, and seeing that  future generations of incoming students  aren’t being treated the same should be  changed. Brandeis students should in tend to research public school segregation  since most of the students have lived in  Waltham. Public school segregation has  been a problem since before 1974. Families,  community members as well as student  bodies should bring light to the situation  that has been concealed and reserved for  a while.  

Respectfully,  

Allison Herrera Padilla