jersey City, New Jersey, is a blue-collar, crime-ridden area across the Hudson River from New York City. Some 86 per cent of the students in its public schools are minorities— speaking thirty different languages in all—and close to a third of them are supported by welfare. In 1987, the district had a dropout rate close to 20 per cent, while only 26 per cent passed the state’s proficiency exam for entry into ninth grade. The curriculum is left over from the early Seventies, and that’s not because the administrators favor traditional ways of teaching. The aging buildings are splattered with graffiti, the hallways and classrooms sadly neglected. Drugs and fighting are common on school grounds, and the quality of education is among the worst in the country.
By May 1988, the situation had become so appalling that the state decided it had no choice but to take the school district over (a decision that was immediately challenged in the courts, which have not yet reached a final verdict). The state report issued at the time, after extensive investigation, concluded that “the Jersey City Board of Education has demonstrated that it is incapable of efficiently governing the school district.” Other observers agreed. As rumors floated around concerning the takeover, the Jersey Journal reported, “If the state had any remaining doubts about the need for intervening in the Jersey City public-school system, they should have been erased by last week’s meeting of the board . . . The meeting itself was as orderly as a stampede. And made about as much sense.”
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