Schools 60 years ago were separate but not equal. Black students were not only segregated but wholly denied meaningful educational opportunity. It is too easy to forget that the Brown decision was propelled not merely by a principled objection to the idea of “separate but equal,” but by Southern states’ unrestrained contempt for the “equal” part of the formula. Correcting these policy shortcomings is essential if the promise of Brown is to be fulfilled.
Expensive but necessary resources include high-quality early childhood programs, from birth to school entry high-quality after-school and summer programs full-service school health clinics more skilled teachers and smaller classes.But resource equality itself is insufficient disadvantaged students require much greater resources than middle-class white students to prepare for success in school. Inequalities still exist in some places, although they are much smaller. Schools for black children had enormous resource shortages in 1954.Academic achievement of African Americans has improved dramatically in recent decades, but whites’ has as well, so racial achievement gaps remain huge.
Initial school integration gains following Brown stalled and black children are more racially and socioeconomically isolated today than at any time since data have been available (1970).Although Brown stimulated a civil rights movement that desegregated many facets of American society, it was least successful in integrating education, the decision’s aim.
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