A few weeks ago I shared with the mailing list a wonderful testimony by Grant Stevenson, the pastor heading up ISAIAH these days, to the House Education Finance Committee. I’ve included that message “below the fold” here, but what I really want to let you know about is ISAIAH’s Leadership Action Day on Saturday (April 9) from 9am – 2pm. Lunch is included if you RSVP right away to Amity.Foster@isaiah-mn.org.
The main event is from 11am to 1pm and will engage legislative leaders from both parties in a dialogue about how we might work together to create a path that leads to health, racial equity, opportunity, and shared growth. ISAIAH has invited Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch, House Speaker Kurt Zellers, Senate Minority Leader Terry Bonoff, and House Minority Leader Paul Thissen to join in this dialogue.
Details are in this PDF flier.= = =
My name is Grant Stevensen. I am a Lutheran pastor at the St. Matthews/Spirit of Truth community. I live with my wife and children in St. Paul. I am the president of the ISAIAH organization, an organization of over 100 congregations committed to social and racial equity and justice.
Our organization is deeply concerned about the proposed cuts to the schools in our urban core. Sepcifically we are opposed to cuts in money intended for the racial integration of our schools.
You may hear in the course of this debate today concerns over the over site of the 13 million dollars intended for racial integration. We applaud that. Over site, transparency and accountability is your job and we applaud any efforts that ensure funds are used for the desired outcome of racial integration.
A second concern and even more shocking is the ending of the requirement that schools even try to be racially integrated. This is a major change and there has been no public debate about it. We have set a standard for decades in Minnesota that the racial integration of our schools is a priority but when you look at the Omnibus bill you can’t even tell that this major change is being proposed. Even these testimonies today, as been pointed out by some members of the committee are taking place before a public explanation of the bill. Where is the transparency in that process?
Many studies have shown that students and particularly less privileged students do better in school that are racially and economically integrated. Ending the funding and the requirement for such integration makes me wonder what the plan for the success of these students is to be.
I know that there is conversation about choice and vouchers, but let us not abdicate our responsibility for each child.
Our conviction as people of faith, a conviction we know is shared far beyond the places where we worship, is that we are one community with a common destiny.
When we think of ourselves in some other way, as individuals and communities that are fundamentally different from each other, that have different interests and different futures we do down a very different path.
I grew up in Minnesota but I have visited and lived in many other places. I have been to South Africa and it is a fact that when the educational and economic gap gets wider and wider as it has in Minnesota, we arrive at a place that is not easy to live in, no matter which side of the gated community you are on.
Robust diversity is a new reality for us.
If you are a retired person living in MN, one in 25 of your age groupu is a person of color. If you are under 18 it is one in three. Racial inequality and segregation at 1 in 25 is a moral disgrace. Racial segregation at 1 in 3 is social catastrophe. This bill takes us in exactly the wrong direction.
The demographics of Minnesota are changing in every way it is a wonderful change, but leadership is required at this moment. This is NOT the time to say “Everyone for themselves” but a time to affirm much older Minnesota values.
Values that say…We are in this together! All of the children are our children!
Leadership is not, “here’s some coupons, good luck to you”.
Leadership is setting the standard and the expectation that as we grow as a state we will grow together, we will prosper together, everyone will matter and everyone will succeed! Most of us grew up in that Minnesota and that’s the kind of leadership we need again.
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