Drawing on interviews with parents of public-school students in who joined learning pods for the 2020-21 school year, this paper argues that the COVID-19 pandemic may have had a narrowing effect on the worlds of children in ways that increase their socio-spatial isolation along vectors of race and class. Interviews with parents who started…

This report provides an overview of the struggle to desegregate schools in the United States. It describes the two phases of desegregation, focusing on court decisions that influenced desegregation and how these decisions changed the composition of the schools. It opens with the 1849 decision that asserted that desegregation was for the good of…

Views concerning the influence of the 1954 Supreme Court decision in "Brown versus the Board of Education" which ended school segregation are discussed. Historian Raymond Wolters believes that while segregation was wrong and the Supreme Court's unanimous decision reversing the "separate but equal" interpretation was right, the…

This study evaluates the process of desegregation in Buffalo City Public Schools and adds to educational change literature in two ways. First, it analyzes the initiation and implementation phases of school desegregation by describing how the innovation was shaped by participants to fit the system using it. Second, the technique of event analysis…

In this paper, the author analyzes what has happened since 1954 in the area of school integration and suggests what he feels are appropriate policies for the future. He identifies two major changes that have affected school integration since 1954--a change in residential patterns that has increased segregation in recent years, and a change in the…

As part of a desegregation plan in Detroit, teachers in recently desegregated schools were involved in an in-service program designed to provide for equal instructional opportunity. One hundred fifty-eight elementary teachers, 99 middle school teachers, and 49 high school teachers in 306 classrooms participated in the program. Teacher -student…

This paper discusses how trends in school racial desegregation suggest a move back toward segregation. Courts are more willing now to attribute these patterns of racial segregation to demographic changes in residential housing markets rather than to past vestiges of the segregated system as they had done in the past. School officials and community…

The focus of this report is on the utility of desegregation as a method for achieving racial equality. Background information is provided through a discussion of the Brown Decision, a review of related literature and the meaning of racial equality. Comparisons of black and white achievement scores are used to address the question of equality.…

The Brown v. Board of Education decision upheld a civil rights ideal that was based on the personal interests of the students; it made no requirement for a perfect racial balance in all classrooms throughout the offending school district. Yet the ensuing, forced desegregation plans that involved long-distance busing, and other measures based on…

This paper traces the history of a magnet school which opened in 1975 amid claims that it would serve as a model of high quality integrated education but which, three years later, was widely perceived as an overcrowded, predominantly black institution. The local Board of Education decided to open a magnet school in which new teaching techniques…

As a result of the busing plan in effect in Jefferson County (Kentucky), minority children are bused over a longer period than whites and minority children are bused out of their local communities more often than whites. In order to assess possible effects of these different busing patterns, a sample of 464 white and minority middle and high…

This study compares the long-term desegregation effectiveness of voluntary plans with magnet schools to mandatory reassignment plans with magnet schools. The introduction includes an extensive discussion of the problems of choosing dependent variables for use in desegregation studies. The potential study population was chosen based on the…

This paper examines the major social science contributions to racial balance as a policy alternative to the unequal educational opportunity suffered by Afro-Americans. It is argued that, although the policy is considered by advocates and the courts to be a remedy for discrimination, it is in fact a continuation of white dominance, or racism. It is…

Desegregation in elementary schools in Springfield, Massachusetts, must be rated a success. Implementation of the desegregation program, which became a reality in 1974, was successful because of the following factors: strong leadership from the superintendent; support of the mayor and the school committee (in spite of their opposition to mandatory…

The extent and impact of racial and ethnic segregation in California high schools in the 1988-89 school year are examined, using data on 896 high schools and 198,127 twelfth-grade students. Racial segregation and ethnic segregation are widespread. Segregation can lead to achievement differences across schools and among ethnic groups. (SLD)