Fairfax Success Masks Gap for Black Students

Consider Woodville Elementary School, in one of Richmond's high-crime neighborhoods. Nearly all the students are black; nearly all are poor. More than once, the school has been locked down because of gunfire outside.

But for Principal Rosalind C. Taylor, the message for her students is simple: "If you don't get it, you work until you do."

Woodville students take mini-tests each week to make sure the material is sinking in. If it isn't, there is tutoring before school, after school and on Saturdays. One day last month, four Woodville fifth-graders barely failed a reading test in preparation for the statewide Standards of Learning. The next afternoon, an assistant principal was planning extra help for them.

Changes in Richmond came partly in response to the No Child act, signed into law in 2002. Struggling systems such as Richmond had to make big changes to avoid being labeled a failing district.

Fairfax didn't have that pressure.

In Fairfax, most children do well no matter their background. As the largest school system in the Washington area and the 12th-largest nationwide, it is a diverse district ethnically and socioeconomically. Children from affluent families sit alongside poor children and immigrants learning English. There are about 164,000 students.

Richmond has about 24,700 students, Norfolk about 37,000. Last year, Fairfax spent about $11,200 per pupil, according to the Virginia Department of Education, and Richmond spent about $12,200. About $9,000 was spent on each Norfolk student.

Some black children in Fairfax excel academically. The number of black students in Advanced Placement classes has been rising, and the district is working to increase the number of blacks in gifted programs and the elite math and science magnet school, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology.

"We made the assumption that our program was so full and so rich that our students would learn, and most of them did," Monday said. "We said, 'We need to do better,' but we had a good deal of students who were passing right out of the blocks."

Beyond the testing and tutoring, there is another, more elusive ingredient in Richmond's recipe for academic success: demanding it from all students.

Harvard University researcher Ronald F. Ferguson surveyed students from 95 schools in 10 states, asking why they worked hard in school. Students of all races said college was a motivator, but more blacks and Hispanics, compared with whites, checked "My teachers encourage me to work hard."

Fairfax School Board member Stephen M. Hunt (At Large) is among those who worries that society and the schools aren't giving students enough of that kind of motivation.