Scholars of the civil rights movement may recall that, after the bus boycott in Montgomery, the bus system there never developed to the extent of bus systems in larger cities, because segregationists were so bent on denying Black people access to public facilities that they would rather see the transit system destroyed, than grant Black citizens the right to ride in the front of the bus. Sadly, the nation has come full circle as right-wing extremists have taken much the same stand, as did their southern White predecessors, by risking the fall of the U.S. economy, rather than allowing the country to get stronger under the leadership of a Black man. The call for “federal protection under the law” is being replaced by the cry of “States rights” where the people in power are doing the most crying. The politics are paralyzing the nation and jeopardizing our children’s hopes for a promising future.
Case in point, politicians have played on the heart strings of their constituents, convincing them that a public education yields an inferior education that is no longer worth supporting with tax dollars. Consequently, when it is time to vote on education matters, other public services—fire departments, parks, and even prisons—routinely win their campaigns for funding, while public school districts struggle to pass levies. What’s more, proponents of private and charter schools have helped siphon off funds that, otherwise, would have been used to support public schools.
Separate and Really Unequal
Decades of systematic neglect of civil rights policy and related educational and community reforms have led to a disturbing trend in public education—segregation (Orfield, 2009). According to a study released by the Civil Rights Project (Frankenberg & Orfield, 2009), public schools are more segregated by race, today, than they were when the civil rights bill was signed in 1964. Schools are separate and unequal—nearly back to the way they were when the Supreme Court handed down the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, designed to end racially-segregated schools (Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 1954).
Pre-Brown v. Board of Education, Black students and White students in the south were forbidden to attend the same schools. Having grown up in a small, southern town where Jim Crow laws were enforced, I attended all-Black schools led by all-Black administrators, faculty, and staff. I never really thought about what it would be like to attend school with White girls and boys until my all-Black high school was forced to be integrated into the much larger, all-White high school. I managed to overcome the challenges of desegregation with the help of my caring family, church, and Black teachers. In fact, my story could have been very different, had I not been blessed with family and positive teachers who believed in me and encouraged me to dream big, study hard, and work hard.
Unfortunately, too many minoritized students do not have the support systems to help them overcome the challenges of today’s re-segregation. They suffer from “caring deprivation”—a syndrome that cuts or denies students the support systems that instill a sense of pride in their heritage or reinforce their attributes. The result is an education system that has flatlined for most minoritized students and has required life support for the rest.
Poison in the Policies
I contend that there is a correlation between the resegregation of schools and our nation’s decline in academic achievement. The fact that the U.S. California California
A Battle
Just as legislation that promotes segregation has aided in the systematic dismantling of public schools, it will take legislation to restore confidence in our ailing schools. Already, several states have taken aggressive measures to render public schools obsolete. For instance, unless Senate Bill 5 (SB5) in Ohio
Proponents of widening the chasm in education between the races not only deny the minoritized students access to equal education, but they also deny their own children access to acceptance of differences and respect for humankind, much the way that segregationists denied Black citizens access to equal seating on the buses of Montgomery.
References
Brown v. Board Education of Topeka , 347 U.S.
De Nies, Y. (2010, August 9). President Obama Outlines Goal to Improve College Graduation Rate in U.S.
Frankenberg, E. & Orfield, G. (2007). Lessons in Integration: Realizing the Promise of Racial
Diversity in America’s Schools. Charlottesville : University of Virginia Press
Geshekter, C. (2008, September 25). The effects of proposition 209 on California
Orfield, G. (January, 2009). Reviving the goal of an integrated Society: A 21st Century Challenge.
This is very interesting! The fascinating thing is that the numbers discourage the average student. The decline of college graduates is also produced by the larger number of students enrolling due to the declining economy. More poeple are being pushed out of their jobs and into school to train for alternative forms of employment, but with the lack of financing, they leave the institution with no degree and the witch hunter Sallie Mae on their backs! Either way its bad news for the public school system. I love this article...is there a possibility of me re-running this post on my website?
ReplyDeleteThe impact of current policies is clear but in this age of government uncertainty what must be done to move things forward?
ReplyDelete