News | Center for Education and Civil Rights

School District ‘Secession’ Is Segregation By Another Name

Huffpost Politics, September 4, 2019 by Rebecca Klein "Communities around the country are creating new, whiter districts." When Penn State University professor Erica Frankenberg graduated from high school in Alabama, there was only one school district in Mobile County...

Study: 'Splinter' districts increase school segregation in the South

Education Dive, September 4, 2019 by Linda Jacobsen Researchers write that district secession is "eroding what has historically been one of the cornerstones of school desegregation in the South: the one-county, one-school-system jurisdiction." Communities that break away...

When School District Secede

Politico Morning Education, September 4, 2019 by Nicole Gaudiano WHEN SCHOOL DISTRICTS SECEDE: School district secessions in seven counties in Alabama, Louisiana and Tennessee in recent years have increasingly sorted white and black students and white and Hispanic...

Secessions Have Heightened the Racial Divide Between Southern School Districts, New Research Shows

The 74 Million, September 4, 2019 by Kevin Mahnken The recent and highly publicized trend of school district secessions has contributed to racial segregation between school districts, according to a new study published in the journal of the America Educational Research...

Study finds carving up school districts worsens segregation

Associated Press, September 4, 2019 by Jeff Amy PIKE ROAD, Ala. (AP) — Pike Road High School graduates its first senior class this school year, and leaders of this sprawling, semi-rural suburb of Alabama’s capital city extol the young community’s focus on education as...

Guest Blog Post: Of Schools, Busing, Integration And Outdated Federal Policy

The American Association of School Administrators, July 29, 2019 Few expected busing to be a major issue during the June 27 Democratic debate. The spirited exchange between Senator Kamala Harris and former Vice President Joe Biden was unexpected by just about everyone, since this...

Busing Worked in Louisville. So Why Are Its Schools Becoming More Segregated?

New York Times, July 28, 2019 When she saw the news images of angry white mobs pelting school buses with rocks and bottles, Sherlonda Lewis was glad that she was not among the black students being bused to a school in a white neighborhood. It was 1975, and Louisville had initiated...

Do Charters Further Segregate America’s Schools? Yes, New Study Says, But Most Blame Lies Elsewhere

Chalkbeat, July 24, 2019 What is to blame for America’s segregated schools? Housing patterns and school attendance boundaries play big roles, certainly. But some have also pointed the finger at another culprit: charter schools. An Associated Press analysis from 2017 found that...

What School Segregation Looks Like in the US Today

Truthout, July 20, 2019 Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, a senator from California, has spoken about how she benefited from attending Berkeley’s desegregated schools . “There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public...

Getting the Busing Story Right, 40 Years Later

Phi Delta Kappan, July 17, 2019 For three weeks now, news outlets have been pumping out stories about busing, a topic unexpectedly restored to prominence by a dramatic Democratic primary campaign debate moment when Senator Kamala Harris challenged former Vice President Joe Biden...

I Grew Up In A City Where Busing Worked

HuffPost, July 16, 2019 Kamala Harris’ takedown of Democratic presidential rival Joe Biden over his past opposition to busing — the euphemistic name for America’s halfhearted attempts , in the 1970s and ’80s, to desegregate public schools — was undeniably compelling political...

As Dems Debate Busing, Southern Schools Slowly Desegregate

Associated Press, July 11, 2019 This small Mississippi Delta town serves as a reminder that fierce debates over the integration of black and white students are not a thing of the past. Two rival high schools in Cleveland, one historically black and the other historically white,...

How Joe Biden, Kamala Harris Sparked a School Segregation Debate That’s Way Overdue

The Philadelphia Inquirer, July 9, 2019 If you grew up as a high school kid in the 1970s (as, ahem, I did) then it would be hard to imagine the day that the debate over school busing to achieve racial desegregation — or, “forced busing,” as opponents masterfully branded it — would...

The Legacy Of Busing And School Desegregation

1A, July 9, 2019 Sen. Kamala Harris told the nation a story two weeks ago. Here is what she said. And I will say also that — that, in this campaign, we have also heard — and I’m going to now direct this at Vice President Biden, I do not believe you are a racist, and I agree with...

Segregation Has Soared in America’s Schools as Federal Leaders Largely Looked Away

Los Angeles Times, July 8, 2019 Nearly 50 years have passed since Kamala Harris joined the legions of children bused to schools in distant neighborhoods as the United States attempted to integrate its racially segregated public schools. Yet the consequences of racial and economic...