RACE IN AMERICA - Stubborn School Segregation

"How do we solve stubborn segregation in schools?" PBS NewsHour 1/7/2016

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Despite a historic Supreme Court ruling outlawing segregated schools, today huge numbers of students remain in separate and unequal schools, most in inner cities.  Special correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault talks with Pedro Noguera of the University of California, Los Angeles, about the consequences of such inequality and what can be done.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT (NewsHour):  Despite an historic Supreme Court ruling some 61 years ago outlawing segregated schools, today, huge numbers of students remain in separate and unequal schools, most in inner cities.

But it doesn’t have to be that way, says Pedro Noguera, director of the Center for Study of School Transformation at UCLA.  I met him in New York, where he was about to speak with a group of educators.

Professor Noguera, thank you so much for joining us.

Sixty-one years after separate and unequal was ruled illegal, you say it’s still happening.  Why?

PEDRO NOGUERA, University of California, Los Angeles:  Well, it’s happening because the courts have basically made it very difficult to continue to pursue integration.

And that’s after we made quite a bit of progress in this country, especially in the South, but now we know that schools in the North and the West are more segregated now than they were 30 years ago.  So, we now find ourselves in a situation where not only are schools increasingly racially separate, but we’re also concentrating the poorest children in schools that have the fewest resources.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT:  Why?

PEDRO NOGUERA:  I would say it’s a combination of lack of investment in schools that serve poor children and the fact that we have no longer the political will.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT:  But you have argued that separate schools play a role in perpetuating inequality, not just in the schools, but in general.

PEDRO NOGUERA:  They do.

They do, because separate has still been unequal in education.  The racially separate schools, even when the schools do a good job, the learning opportunities you have a child will influence the kind of college you go into, the kind of profession you have access to, the kind of income you earn.

And so if we really are interested in creating a society that’s more equal and less characterized by racial divisions, then we need to put more investment in education and leveling the playing field and integrating our schools.