The New York Times has a good story today about efforts in Prince Edward County, Va., to reverse the lingering results of segregated schools and the response to the Brown v. Board decision. There is great perspective in here that is too often missing in revisionist looks at the history of the public schools and Jim Crow. It is easy to forget that not only segregation itself, but the response by states like Virginia and Mississippi to efforts to end it have crippled people from the chance at equal opportunity. Please take a read. Here are some excerpts.
Warren Brown was about to enter first grade in 1959 when officials chained up the public schools in Prince Edward County rather than allow black children to sit beside white children in a classroom. Without the resources to send him away, his mother kept him at home for four years, until she found a local church offering classes to black children.
Mr. Brown graduated from high school in 1972, winning basketball scholarships from three colleges, only to turn them down because he feared the academics would have been too challenging.
"I didn't get a proper foundation," he said. "If you're not prepared, what good is the school going to do for you?"
This fall, however, Mr. Brown, at the age of 51, plans to go to college to study criminal justice. ...
A 1951 lawsuit challenging segregation was consolidated with four others to become the 1954 landmark case Brown v. Board of Education, which said separate but equal education for blacks and whites was unconstitutional.
Officials here largely ignored the decision, emboldened by state law passed in 1956 known as "massive resistance" that created a voucher program to allow white children to attend private schools. The Farmville Herald, the local newspaper, said in a March 20, 1959, editorial, describing efforts by outsiders to enforce Brown, "It is all part of the diabolical Communist plan to disrupt American life and reduce the white race to impotency."
In June 1959, the Prince Edward County Board of Supervisors withdrew all financial support of public schools as a way to close them and skirt the order of the Brown decision. Intended for black children, it was a decision that affected white families as well. Even with the state vouchers, not all of them could afford tuition at the private schools, which makes whites eligible for the scholarships as well.
Over the next few years, opposition to the county's segregationist policies gained strength, leading to a Supreme Court decision, Griffin v. Board of Education of Prince Edward County, in 1964, in which the court declared that every American child had a Constitutional right to a public school education. That ruling forced local officials to reopen their schools for all children.
In the void, however, lives were shattered, families were split, dreams died. While local leaders tried to maintain quality education for whites, black families were left to fend for themselves. Some shipped their children to relatives and strangers in distant counties and states so they could attend public schools or learn from tutors. Others kept their children at home, even if it meant years without instruction.
Previous Comments
- ID
- 171591
- Comment
What a marvelous way to address past injustices, and what an appropriate way to pay something back to those who had their chance to compete for opportunities withheld from them. It's late, but never too late.
- Author
- C.W.
- Date
- 2005-08-01T20:32:27-06:00
- ID
- 171592
- Comment
Better late than never, huh? It would be nice to see that here, but I think that it's a snowball's chance in a microwave oven before our legislature would do that. However, I would like to see something done for current JPS students. I was frustrated when my nephew would ask me for help for his homework, but he couldn't bring home the textbook because there weren't enough to go around. You would think they would have enough materials in middle school! Fortunately, he got special permission to bring books home since we found out he has ADD, and his grades shot up, but I want every child to have the same benefit. They give the students handouts, but I think a textbook should be a basic reference tool when studying or doing work at home.
- Author
- L.W.
- Date
- 2005-08-01T22:02:24-06:00
- ID
- 171593
- Comment
Of course, I lived in Tampa, FL and the kids there could not bring home the texts either. They are on double shifts in many school systems down there! First shift - 7 am - noon, Second shift - 1 pm - 6pm. If text books in K-12 are as expensive as mine were in college, I can see how that would burden a public school system. I wonder if there is some way to get the publishers to lower their cost for the poorer school systems.
- Author
- Steph
- Date
- 2005-08-02T08:19:05-06:00
- ID
- 171594
- Comment
Steph, maybe we can bring that idea to the JPS school board. Perhaps a letter or something official looking.
- Author
- L.W.
- Date
- 2005-08-02T11:44:45-06:00
- ID
- 171595
- Comment
Maybe they've already negotiated the lowest price for texts, but maybe they haven't. I wish we had a contact out there (anyone?) who has inroads at a major publishing house for school textbooks. Maybe all it takes is to ask for a lower price for school systems that are struggling financially. Maybe you could find them slightly used at a clearinghouse. There are a few possibilities that could be explored. For example, does the Bill Gates Foundation give grants to buy textbooks?
- Author
- Steph
- Date
- 2005-08-02T12:11:41-06:00
- ID
- 171596
- Comment
The kids can't take the textbooks home for study and homework? What the...... I had no idea. No child left behind except those in poor neighborhoods who go to poor schools? Is that what I'm hearing?
- Author
- C.W.
- Date
- 2005-08-02T19:56:40-06:00
- ID
- 171597
- Comment
It is a sad truth that many schools have decided it is easier to keep the books at school and share when needed, then to hold the student accountable for the use and return of the book as when we were young. I thought keeping up with your books was part of being a student? However, this does not excuse our gov't (Fed or State) from not properly funding our schools so they have the necessary supplies and books to learn from - at school or at home. I know it sounds funny; but, I was a little more pumped (if you can be pumped in school about a class) when the class got new books or even books that were a year old or so. It was almost like getting a new present except it was a darn school book! I would say I even took better care of the newer books? Much better then when you were given the Algebra textbook with 15 names listed in the front cover and a spine that is held together by the threads of nylon left from the binding that disappeared 13 years ago!
- Author
- tortoise
- Date
- 2005-08-02T21:48:46-06:00
- ID
- 171598
- Comment
I'm with you, tortoise. I used to love when I got a nw textbook and heard the glue crack when I opened it (I was such a geek) and all the cool illustrations. I still enjoyed the illustrations in older books and looked at the names of those who carried the book before me as if it was history in the making. Yeah, I read into things a little too deeply, even as a kid. Probably explains my current neurosis...:-D
- Author
- L.W.
- Date
- 2005-08-07T15:05:13-06:00
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