Integration and Diversity

Research in this section explores the impacts and benefits of racial and ethnic diversity in education, as well as resegregation trends and remedies in our nation's public schools.

The Last Have Become First: Rural and Small Town America Lead the Way on Desegregation

Back in the early l960s when there were civil rights struggles across the South in large cities, small towns and rural areas, it would have been shocking to suggest that rural areas would become beacons of interracial education while the great urban centers of the Northeast would have vastly more segregated schools, often only a few percentage points from total apartheid. Southern leaders at the time such as Alabama Governor George Wallace and Mississippi Senator John Stennis often predicted that that the North would never desegregate, attacking what he called Northern hypocrisy. The statistics we present in this report shows that such a pattern has clearly developed, though caused in a way they never suspected--driven by a Supreme Court that first limited and then rolled back desegregation efforts to the point where desegregated schools tend to be in areas without large areas of residential segregation. Policies and legal requirements for desegregation in urban schools have now been largely nullified by court decisions but those that desegregated the rural and small town South remain in effect.

Historic Reversals, Accelerating Resegregation, and the Need for New Integration Strategies

This report released by The Civil Rights Project at UCLA finds that for the first time in three decades, the South is in danger of losing its leadership as the nation's most integrated schools. The report examines the effects of the dual processes of racial transformation and resegregation on the educational opportunity of students, as well as the relationship between race and poverty and its implications in light of the recent Supreme Court decisions. The report concludes with recommendations for school districts.

The Segregation of American Teachers

Data from a survey of over 1,000 teachers in K-12 public schools across the country show that our teaching force — like public school students — is largely segregated. Teachers of different races are teaching students of very different racial composition, adding an extra dimension to growing student racial segregation.

PICS: Brief of 553 Social Scientists on School Desegregation Submitted to US Supreme Court

A social science statement has been submitted to the United States Supreme Court with the signatures of 553 social scientists and researchers, urging the Court to permit the continuation of voluntary race-conscious student assignment plans in American public schools.

School Accountability Under NCLB: Aid or Obstacle for Measuring Racial Equity?

We conclude from the analysis presented in this policy brief that AYP and the state proficiency targets are not very informative when it comes to determining educational progress because of the ways the law has been changed. The AYP data does not allow us to say whether schools are getting better because some states have retained their original standards while others have modified them. Since states are going in opposite directions—some states report a decline in the number of schools identified for improvement while others report an increase—it is difficult to know how much progress has been made improving student performance.

Data Proposals Threaten Education and Civil Rights Accountability

The U.S. Department of Education has proposed sweeping changes in the way we count minority and white students in our schools, changes that would dramatically alter the reported enrollment by race and ethnicity in our states and in many of our educational institutions. The changes are partly in response to a need recognized in the 2000 Census to collect information on students who are biracial or multiracial in their background. However, the Department of Education has proposed changes that are very different from the Census changes and would make it extremely difficult, and sometimes impossible, to conduct meaningful research or monitor civil rights compliance and educational accountability for students by race and ethnicity. The guidelines published August 7, 2006 in the Federal Register, specifythe changes by which schools, colleges, and state governments will collect and report individual-level data and aggregate data on race and ethnicity.

Private School Racial Enrollments and Segregation

Though religious schools are not now under any desegregation requirements from courts and this report does not assess blame for the patterns reported, private school educators do have freedom to provide leadership in this area, and could well consider the techniques used by public magnet schools and secular private institutions. Moreover, private schools may well be held publicly accountable should they become publicly funded through voucher systems.