Forced Racial Desegregation in Schools

Let’s be clear: Brown vs. Board of Education was a triumph and one of the most important moments of the 20th century. That decision cleared the way for many improvements in the lives of blacks in the U.S. It was the first step on a long journey that I believe has almost been completed. On the day the Supreme Court ruled on the issue the pendulum swung hard in the direction of justice and good. Unfortunately, as is so often the case in the American experiment, the pendulum has to swing back the other way before it can settle in the middle.

When Brown vs. BoE required school districts to desegregate, a logical side-effect was racial quotas. After all, Uncle Sam needed a way to measure progress. To achieve the desired results many districts resorted to a program of forced integration commonly called ‘busing’. In this scenario white children would be ‘bused’ to predominantly black schools and vice versa. Students were selected for this program using a variety of methods, usually involving their last name, rotating selection based on age, etc. The results are still heavily debated and varied.

In 2007 racial quota programs in Louisville, KY and Seattle, WA were challenged in the Supreme Court. SCOTUS ruled in favor of the plaintiffs and set in motion changes that are just now being implemented. I am not familiar with programs all over the country so I can only speak about the Louisville experience with racial quotas and what is being done to reform the system.

During the debate over the issue one thing that became very clear to me is that busing was contrary to the most critical problem facing public schools, namely parental involvement. Imagine this scenario:

A young black woman has two children, ages 10 and 12. The youngest attends an elementary school down the block from their apartment (her reside school). The oldest is ‘bused’ to a predominantly white school 30 minutes across town. Let us also imagine that this young mother also has little support in raising her children, given the fact that absentee fathers are common in the black community. She works 50 hours per week in a warehouse shipping department. She has a car that is usually reliable but occasional break-downs mean she rides the bus until she can get it to a mechanic. She makes decent money and the family has a modest home, but the thing really lacking is time.  The mother gets home most evenings around 7pm, gets dinner on the table and helps with homework and then the evening is just about over.  

Now any teacher worth their pay will tell you that parental involvement is one of the most critical elements to a child being successful in school. Regular attendance at parent-teacher conferences, communication with teachers, PTA involvement, ensuring good attendance, supervision of their studies. All of these are the responsibility of parents. So now we ask our young mother to get home at 7 and then make it to an 8 pm conference to discuss the trouble her oldest child is having in math. Or we ask her to attend a PTA meeting that evening. Or how about taking her oldest to a basketball game so he can feel a bit of school pride. All of these things are hard enough, but imagine a scenario where the child’s school is on the other side of town because he is ‘bused’ to meet racial quotas.

Hard to imagine? This scenario was amazingly common under busing in Louisville. In the era before email or phones in classroom parents in this scenario would often never meet their children’s teachers. They might go years without even communicating with them. And this wasn’t because they didn’t care…it was simply because it was too hard.

By eliminating forced busing and de-emphasizing racial diversity at schools, the opportunity presents itself for schools to become centers of their communities. Putting their children’s schools right in their midst, enabling them to see the school on their drive home every night, making the commute to this school a quick one….all of these things give us a chance to make schools a more important part of their local communities.

As a product of Catholic schools I have seen firsthand how these churches / schools become community centers. I have also seen it translate well to newer elementary schools (and even a few middle schools) in our district that are not subject to busing. When the students live in close proximity to the school PTA membership and overall parental involvement soars.

It is my sincere hope that this reality will start to be balanced against the perceived needs of racial diversity to create a scenario where parental involvement improves.