parent after parent after parent they were complaining and there was screaming they were not just

talking they were screaming at them that I I had never seen anything like that before and

it was every parent I disappeared more and more from my chair I was like in front row

in 2019 school district 28 was chosen by the New York City Department of Education to go

through a diversity planning process district 28 is in Queens often titled as the most diverse

place in the world but almost anyone in the district will tell you there's a north side and a south

side at the first public meeting about this diversity plan parents from the north side of the

district showed up in force to express their opposition I do know that there were people in the

room who were supportive of it of it it was just we were a minority maybe I don't know two three

people five at most Simone Dornbach was one of those supportive parents Simone is white and

lives on the north side she's a social worker and a mediator she once worked on a national

reconciliation conference in Uganda to bring people together after a civil war and still she was

shocked by what she saw that night in district 28 and so I didn't speak and I was so glad

because I just felt like I am the only person in here who actually think this is a good idea

and that was really for me the moment when when I got scared

I for the first time had doubts I had always thought it's a good thing to integrate schools I felt like

what is happening why am I the only person who think this is the right thing to do why is everyone

around me not feeling that way something wrong with me but the testimony that made Simone feel the

most disheartened actually came from one of the few parents who spoke up from the south side of the

district her name is Lorraine Reed why aren't we instead of worrying about spreading out all the

inequalities focus on the schools in the south build the schools up in the south with the necessary

the basic necessary tools that the students need I not even thought that black parents would

...