News | Center for Education and Civil Rights

How To Secede From Belgium Without Really Trying (radio broadcast)

The Collin McEnroe Show—WNPR, February 27, 2020 Secession is in the air. Britain withdrew from the European Union, Scotland wants out of the UK, Catalonia from Spain, and, wait for it, California from the U.S. Yes, the days of our country's states being united may soon come to an...

Hidden Segregation Within Schools Is Tracked in New Study

Education Week, February 25, 2020 by Sarah D. Sparks Eliminating racial segregation can be a little like playing whack-a-mole: Instead of going away, too often it just finds a new outlet. A massive new study of North Carolina classrooms over nearly 20 years finds that as...

‘You can’t help but to wonder’: Crumbling schools, less money, and dismal outcomes in the county that was supposed to change everything for black children in the South

THE HECHINGER REPORT, February 10, 2020 by Bracey Harris The Supreme Court’s decision in Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education was supposed to force Southern schools to desegregate after more than a decade of stalling. Half a century later, another generation of...

Five Of The Country’s Most Economically Segregated School District Borders Are In Western PA

90.5 WESA, January 27, 2020 by Sarah Schneider Five of the country’s 50 most economically segregated neighboring school districts are located in Western Pennsylvania. That’s according to a national study by New Jersey-based think tank Ed Build that was updated with new...

Symposium Sets Tone for South Orange-Maplewood's Intentional Integration Journey

TAPintoSOMA, January 9, 2020 by Alia C. Covel MAPLEWOOD, NJ — A full auditorium at Columbia High School showed how many parents and community members were curious about the Intentional Integration Initiative that South Orange Maplewood School District is embarking upon...

It's One of the Most Fraught Words in Education. What Does It Mean?

Education Week, January 7, 2020 by Mark W. Bomster What do we really mean when we talk about school “segregation” in 2020? Six decades after Brown v. Board of Education ruled segregation by race in public schools unconstitutional, the word retains a punch that can shake a political campaign or turn...

Extremely Separate And Widely Unequal

LAist, December 18, 2019 by Deepa Fernandes More than 65 years after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the "separate but equal" doctrine in its landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision, California's public preschools remain deeply segregated. The numbers...

School Planning Review could transform District

The Notebook, December 3, 2019 by Dale Mezzacappa The District has launched comprehensive review of neighborhood elementary schools that will seek to predict demographic changes rather than just react to them. It also aims to increase access to pre-K and smooth out the...

50 States of Ed: Do choice policies 'undermine' or remain 'vital' to public education?

EducationDive, November 26, 2019 by Naaz Modan Read at EducationDive Addressing a crowd of business leaders earlier this month, U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos reiterated her call for choice-based education reform policies. “America’s...

In Mississippi, an Unlikely Model for School Desegregation

The Wall Street Journal, November 22, 2019 by Tawnell D. Hobbs CLINTON, Miss.-Nearly five decades ago, this town on Jackson's outskirts decided to send students to schools organized by grade level, rather than geography. So all of the kindergartners and first-graders...

Controversial Redistricting Plan Adopted in Maryland School System

The Washington Post, November 22, 2019 by Donna St. George School leaders in suburban Howard County, Md., on Thursday night adopted a controversial redistricting plan that reassigns thousands of students in hopes of relieving crowding and better integrating schools on...

The Trump Administration Is Dismantling Our Tools To Promote School Integration

Teen Vogue, November 5, 2019 by Thea Sebastian During the first Democratic debate of the 2020 presidential campaign, school busing re-emerged in the public consciousness. When Senator Kamala Harris challenged former vice president Joe Biden over federal legislation...

Marches, letters, emotions: School redistricting plan roils a suburban Maryland county

The Washington Post, November 14, 2019 by Donna St. George The battle in the Maryland suburbs started shortly after Howard County announced a school redistricting plan far more ambitious than many had expected. It didn’t just aspire to relieve crowded schools. In a...

Opinion: Separate is never equal in any public school

November 6, 2019, Austin-American Statesman by Rep. Gina Hinojosa “We conclude that, in the field of public education, the doctrine of “separate but equal” has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.” Such was the proclamation from the U.S...

School secession movement drives re-segregation

Facing South, October 25, 2019 by Benjamin Barber Re-segregation is on the rise in American schools. Black students in the South are less likely to attend a majority-white school today than 50 years ago, while black and Latino students are attending schools more likely...