Extant research has shown that students do better academically and socially when they are in schooling environments that are racially and socioeconomically diverse (Coleman, 1966). To date, there is very limited research which has examined the development of adolescents' racial, ethnic, and social identities within the contemporary contexts of…

An examination of past research, policies, and reforms in mathematics education suggests that there have always been, and remain, tensions in conceptualizing the aims and goals of mathematics teaching and learning. While the disproportionality and conditions of marginalized learners is a cause for concern, it is important to understand that…

Building on the premise that closing achievement gaps is an economic imperative both to regain international educational supremacy and to maintain global economic competitiveness, I ask whether it is possible to rewrite the social contract so that education is a fundamental right--a statutory guarantee--that is both uniform across states and…

The racial achievement gap has persisted in the decades since "Brown v. Board," despite large-scale investment in school reform. Accordingly, some administrators and politicians are reconsidering integration policies as a means of addressing the gap. This study examines one Chicago community's discussion of such integration policy.…

This study examines the narratives of three African American teachers who participated in an early desegregation plan that transferred selected African American teachers into all-White schools in the late 1960s and early 1970s. While many of these teachers experienced rejection in their new schools, the three African American teachers in this…

Because educational equity is a developing area, courts have little precedent to guide rulings. Extra-legal evidence may help in deciding what the law is. Social science evidence is also invited by the courts because educational equity law is purportedly an instrument of social change. The sophistication of social science research, as well as the…

Court decisions relating to bilingual education in the United States are synthesized and analyzed. In addition to cases relating specifically to language of instruction, those dealing with desegregation and racial or ethnic discrimination are reviewed. In decisions involving the teaching of foreign languages in elementary school, during the period…

This paper discusses generally the impact of the Brown decision of 1954 on education. It presents five major "lessons" suggested by the history of school desegregation: (1) the attack on bigotry and injustice must be fought on all fronts--with votes, political interest groups, multicultural education, economic planning, and political…

In this statement, the Assistant Attorney General of the Civil Rights Division under the Reagan Administration proposes a method of voluntary school desegregation as an alternative to court litigation and mandatory busing. The method represents a response to the failure of previous desegregation attempts to elicit public support and provide equal…

Analyses of the Brown decision often overstate its importance. For centuries before it was handed down, white Americans regarded blacks as inferior. During the time of slavery, white men (including those of apparent stature, such as Jefferson and Lincoln) felt that for some reason society could do to black people that which it could not do to any…

Cost-effectiveness analysis provides a useful tool for choosing between alternative desegregation plans or justifying one particular plan. Previous analyses of school desegregation effects on white enrollment, which focus only upon costs, have had limited use for policy. Traditional cost-benefit analysis poses problems because of the difficulty of…

This chapter presents a long look at the development of the concept of sex discrimination in education to see whether trends or key cases can be identified and discussed. In this a comparison is essayed with the development of the concept of racial discrimination in education through the school desegregation cases to see what the race cases might…

Federal courts have been charged with devising relief that corrects unconstitutional school segregation since the Supreme Court's historic decision against state-approved dual school systems in "Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka" in 1954. The split decisions of the Supreme Court in segregation cases during the 1970s have made it…

A discussion of the fiscal impact of court-ordered desegregation on the Milwaukee (Wisconsin) public schools delineates the conditions and costs for the program from 1976 to 1979. The court order affected 75 percent of the district's students. In response the school district established a number of specialty schools and provided for the busing of…

A criterion-based assessment procedure was used to evaluate the success of court-ordered desegregation and educational programs in Detroit, Michigan. A monitoring commission was appointed to effect this assessment. This report begins by describing the commission and assessment procedures. The next portion of the report is devoted to materials…