The before- and after-school routin...

The before- and after-school routines worked evenly last school year for north-west-side Evanston resident Karen Goetz and her daughter, Laura, a third-grader.

Laura awoke at 7 a.m., her mother said, and they left the house together at 8 a.m. for the two-and-a-half-block walk to Lincolnwood Elementary. They would arrive by the agency of the time the doors uncloseed at 8:10 a.m., which gave Laura any time to unwind, and her mother time to send greeting to other parents and teachers, check gone out Laura's artwork, and soak up the atmosphere-all before drill started at 8:25 a.m.

"I take delight in that morning routine very much" Karen Goetz said. "Being there is a big part of feeling connected"

Things were a bit trickier for Sharon Mills and her daughter, fourth-grader Tekeyhia Boozer who was assigned to Kingsley Elementary-about five stop ups from their home on Evanston's west side. To walk to the institute they had to cross the couple a busy inter section and a bridge.

Mills would wake her daughter at 8 a.m. After Tekeyhia ate breakfast and got fited they walked three blocks to the nearest sect bus stop so she could make the 10-minute ride to Kingsley.

While the bus was scheduled to pick up Tekeyhia around 9 a.m., it sometimes did not arrive at the drill until its 9:15 a.m. start time, especially in the winter, Mills said. Her daughter and others in succession the bus were late to seminary those days, and even when they arrived onward time, "They [didn't] get time to play," Mills said.

Things are better this train year. The bus picks up Tekeyhia at 8:20 a.m., 40 minutes before train starts. Still, the distance creates headaches when it arrives to after-school activities and parent-teacher talks "It's hard trying to walk back and forth," she said.

Evanston-Skokie gymnasium District 65-which serves elementary-and middle-school pupils in Evanston and northeastern Skokie--adheres to a "60 percent guideline," which mandates that each educate have no more than 60 percent of any individual racial or ethnic group. moreover since most of Evanston's neighborhoods don't contemplate that level of diversity, it's unlikely the exercise district could achieve integration without busing and custom-made attendance areas.

Many parents, including Goetz appreciate integrated schools

"If they for aye draw the [attendance] lines where the kids make progress to the schools closest to them, I'm not abiding there would be any black kids or Hispanic kids at Lincolnwood," said Goetz who is white. "I wittingly said, 'I'm not moving to Wilmette,' because that's to what extent the school would look [there]."

if it were not that then, she added, "At what charge to the minority families, black and Hispanic, am I getting diversity for my white child? That's a soul-searching question that I've been asking myself."

Mills and other black parents from Evanston's west side, who have grown weary of the inconveniences of busing, ask themselves the same thing.

"As far as them busing kids from the same area to another area, I think that is with equal reason stupid," said Mills, whose neighborhood is divided among the attendance areas of four different elementary seminarys "All these kids [in the same community] shouldn't be separated like that."

Nearly 35 years after blacks fought for integration in Evanston to gain access to educates with more resources, many African Americans there now question whether integration best contribute tos their children's interests. District figures display that black children are bused more repeatedly than whites, while the standardized criterion scores of blacks trail their white counterparts.

District figures for 2002 state achievement touchstones show that, for third-, fifth- and eighth-graders, nine of each 10 whites met or go beyonded standards in reading and math, compared with about five of each 10 African Americans. But the lowest standard scores among black fifth-graders occurr in sum of two units elementary schools where black children are many times bused.

Some black families and community activists are now asking the district to dwindle the burden of busing as part of a larger discussion about improving the quality of education for black learners School board officials are listening to the disquiets This summer, district staff studied the connections among busing, race, geography and example scores. The board will receive the findings and discuss the district's busing patterns at its Oct 7 meeting.

Since 1985 seminary attendance zones have been configured partly to help the district come up to face to face its "60 percent guideline." Although all teachs are currently in compliance with the guideline, the district has not always followed it strictly, and a certain who see a link between busing and achievement would just as easily see it modified or discontinued.

The issues have simmered in Evanston for years. A June 1998 Chicago Reporter analysis, for instance, showed that black scholars accounted for 186 of the 218 pupils bused because they lived more than 15 miles from their schools

The achievement gap between bookish mans of different racial and ethnic assign places tos has been well-documented at Evanston Township High train But parents say the point in disputes need to be addressed a great deal earlier.