Time to move on
Juan Williams responds to yesterday’s Supreme Court decision regarding the use of race as a basis for school assignment.
LET us now praise the Brown decision. Let us now bury the Brown decision.
With yesterday’s Supreme Court ruling ending the use of voluntary schemes to create racial balance among students, it is time to acknowledge that Brown’s time has passed. It is worthy of a send-off with fanfare for setting off the civil rights movement and inspiring social progress for women, gays and the poor. But the decision in Brown v. Board of Education that focused on outlawing segregated schools as unconstitutional is now out of step with American political and social realities.
Desegregation does not speak to dropout rates that hover near 50 percent for black and Hispanic high school students. It does not equip society to address the so-called achievement gap between black and white students that mocks Brown’s promise of equal educational opportunity.
And the fact is, during the last 20 years, with Brown in full force, America’s public schools have been growing more segregated — even as the nation has become more racially diverse. In 2001, the National Center for Education Statistics reported that the average white student attends a school that is 80 percent white, while 70 percent of black students attend schools where nearly two-thirds of students are black and Hispanic. (more…)
Williams absolutely nails it in this piece because as he pointed out, this selective process has done NOTHING in addressing the current problems we are having in our public schools. I believe that dissapointment over this decision has more to do with symbolism than the practical. I know this is off topic, but this also reminds me of the whole King-Harbor mess and how folks are more concerned with keeping it a “Black” hospital than the quality it should offer.
June 29th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
And you nailed it, too, Duane! Last night I was at a meeting of my book club (selection this time: Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison), and nearly everyone was talking about “taking away” integrated schools! They bemoaned “the Court’s decision to re-segregate.” Unbelievable! The situation in 1954 and that of 2007 could not be more different. And we need to wake up and see that,
July 2nd, 2007 at 10:43 pm
Integration was never the solution to substandard schools in anybody’s neighborhood. It’s very premise suggests that sitting a child of one race next to a child of a different race can somehow give them a better education, which is absurd. The answer was always to provide substandard schools with the resources they needed, and let children attend schools in their own neighborhoods. This in no way implies that I agree with legal segregation in any form. I just don’t think that integration, in and of itself, has anything to do with improving education for any race. I think choice and vouchers for all would be a much better solution.