"Social science research for a half century has documented the benefits of racial integration for black student achievement, with no corresponding harm to whites. When low income black students attend integrated schools that are mostly populated by middle class white students, achievement improves and the test score gap narrows. By offering only a “diversity” rationale for racial integration, Secretary Duncan indicated that he is either unfamiliar with this research or chooses to ignore it. His response was especially troubling because the segregation of black students is increasing, not decreasing. In 1970, the typical black student attended a school that was 32 percent white. By 2010 it had fallen to 29 percent. The typical black student still attends a school that is majority low-income. In places where black student achievement is most in crisis, the numbers are much worse. In Detroit, for example, in 2000 (the most recent year for which such data have been calculated) the typical black student attended a school where 2 percent of students were white, and 85 percent were low income. Secretary Duncan’s comment on integration was even more shocking for another reason. He stated that we should “increase integration in a voluntary way—I don’t think you could force these kinds of things.” Secretary Duncan is young (only 48 years old) and may not realize that in 20th century discussions of integration, “voluntary” was a code word for massive resistance to desegregation, and saying you can’t “force these kind of things” was the most common rationale for maintenance of black subjugation. We have just celebrated the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington and are about to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 1964 Civil Rights Act that the March promoted. The argument that Lyndon Johnson confronted most frequently when he pressed for passage of the Civil Rights Act was that segregation resulted from racial prejudice and that change could only come from a change, as it was said, “in men’s hearts.” Johnson was, segregationists claimed, trying to “move too fast” by trying to force these kinds of things."
Posted on: Sat, 07 Sep 2013 05:53:17 +0000
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