1 minute read
Failures of desegregation
by Ahmed Sharara staff reporter
On May 17, 1954, all nine Supreme Court justices ruled in favor of the Brown family and other plaintiffs in one of America’s most important landmark cases, Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. The ramifications of the decision led to states across America instituting new desegregation initiatives to aid in the integration process.
Advertisement
However, almost 69 years after Brown v. Board of education, racial segregation is still prevalent in schools today. In research conducted by the Stanford Graduate School of Education, it was found that in large school districts across America, white-Black segregation between schools has increased by 35% since 1991, and white-Hispanic segregation was also higher in 2020 than in 1991.
Racial segregation persists throughout the Mounds View School District as well. As many have realized, Black and Hispanic students make up a substantially larger portion of Irondale High School’s student body than Mounds View High School’s — a portion around 2.6 times greater than Mounds View’s.
While this segregation is likely not entirely intentional, it still begs the question of how it has been allowed to continue.
After the decision of Brown v. Board of Education, school districts across America were no longer allowed to deny student admittance to their schools based on race. Many districts began implanting new methods of integration. At first, schools simply opened enrollment to students of color; however, districts often depended on Black families to transfer to predominantly white schools.
Although this distinction might not seem problematic, it introduces the first mistake made on the path toward integration in America. “You can’t get the idea that just because kids of color go to white schools [they] are better [off], because that is the thing that’s harmed people of color for a long time,” said Justin Benolkin, social studies teacher. Benolkin explains that because only Black students were bused to predominantly white schools, and not the other way around, true integration was never achieved.
