NCSD STAFF UPDATES

What We've Been Up to Recently

ARE YOU CAUGHT UP ON YOUR NCSD READING?

WE'RE IN EVENT MODE!

In addition to planning for our national conference, we have been in conversation with multiple groups about events and presentations related to NCSD's work, including:

• Programming related to NCSD's recently-released report re: Brown's impact on Black Teachers Outside of the South by Professor Zoë Burkholder. (Stay tuned!)
• NCSD director Gina Chirichigno is scheduled to present at the Education Law Association conference in November, alongside Professor Janel George of the Racial Equity in Education Law Policy Clinic at Georgetown Law.
• NCSD director Gina Chirichigno will also be attending Learning Forward's Title II-A Symposium in Orlando, FL on October 29-30.

Let us know if you're interested in connecting with us at an upcoming event or exploring a collaboration!

NEW POVERTY & RACE ISSUE CONTINUES TO EXPLORE BROWN V. BOARD'S LESSER-KNOWN HISTORY

NCSD MEMBER UPDATES

NEWS FROM ACROSS OUR COUNTRY

National -

• The story of how the 14th Amendment has remade America– and how America has remade the 14th. (NPR, Aug 26) - "The 14th Amendment has shaped huge parts of American life. It's been invoked in a wide range of U.S. Supreme Court cases on issues ranging from same-sex marriage and interracial marriage to school segregation and access to birth control. Rund Abdelfatah and Ramtin Arablouei, cohosts of NPR's history show Throughline, bring us an installment of their We the People series, the story of how the 14th Amendment has remade America and how America has remade the 14th."
• Opinion: How a Supreme Court decision kept school segregation alive (Washington Post, Aug 1) - "Today, the Strength in Diversity Act is just one of many initiatives by people working to fulfill the promise of Brown promise and make the enduring hope of metropolitan desegregation real. Fifty years ago this summer, the Supreme Court frustrated those aims, taking us down the wrong path. But those aspirations have never died—and the fight is far from over."

Arkansas -

• Jacksonville/North Pulaski schools attorney says federal monitoring not necessary for new schools (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Aug 26) - "Differences among three Jacksonville/North Pulaski schools in building size, furniture, and wall and floor finishes do not warrant further federal court monitoring of desegregation efforts, an attorney for the district has argued to a judge."
• Little Rock historian links Arkansas’ school voucher push to 1950s fight against desegregation (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Aug 17) - “A historian gave a talk to a small group on Saturday that included the younger sister of Minnijean Brown Trickey, a member of the Little Rock Nine, at the Central High Visitor Center on the post-Lost Year civil rights movement in the city... Donaghey distinguished professor of history, put into context the civil rights movement after the desegregation of Central High School."

California -



• RCSD: School Segregation is a Choice (RWC Pluse, Aug 2) - "There is not one 'choice school' scheme in America that has ever worked—and plenty have tried. Within just a few years, they always lead to underserved schools in underserved districts. It should be in fact one of the most basic Laws of Education Physics."

Connecticut -



• Norwalk schools open 50 seats to Darien, New Canaan, Weston, Westport, Wilton kids (The Hour, Aug 12) - “The district is opening 50 open choice seats across Kendall College and Career Academy, Ponus Ridge STEAM Academy, and P-TECH Norwalk to students from neighboring municipalities for the upcoming school year."

Florida -



• School choice and a history of segregation collide as one Florida county shutters its rural schools (Associated Press, Aug 22) - “Tens of thousands of students have left Florida’s public schools in recent years amid an explosive expansion in school choice. Now, districts large and small are grappling with the harsh financial realities of empty seats in aging classrooms. As some districts are being forced to close schools, administrators are facing another long-avoided reckoning: how to integrate students in buildings that remain racially and economically segregated."

Georgia -



• In a Town Full of Segregation Academies, One Black Family Grapples With the Best School Choice for Their Daughter (ProPublica, Aug 22) - “We identified five private schools likely founded as segregation academies that still operate in Macon, Georgia. They continue to play a key role in school segregation."
• Cookie & Zo’e: A Georgia Family Wrestles With School Choice 60 Years After the Start of Desegregation (documentary)

Kentucky -



• A look at 70 years of transportation, integration and forced busing in Louisville's public schools (WDRB, Aug 1) - "Jefferson County Public Schools will begin a new chapter of its storied transportation history Aug. 8 when nearly 100,000 kids return to class across Louisville. For the last 70 years, Kentucky's largest school district's transportation plan has taken many forms. And on more than one occasion, the plan has made statewide and even national headlines."

Louisiana -



• Oprah Winfrey praises the 'New Orleans Four' during surprise guest appearance at the 2024 DNC (NOLA.com, Aug 22) - "Oprah Winfrey praised the trailblazing 'New Orleans Four' during her surprise guest appearance at the third night of the 2024 Democratic National Convention...Winfrey paid homage to the New Orleans Four—Ruby Bridges, Tessie Prevost, Gail Etienne and Leona Tate—who as first graders in 1960 blazed the pathway for desegregating New Orleans schools." 

Maine -



• Opinion: NIMBYs think they’re protecting Maine; they’re mistaken (Central Maine, Aug 11) - "Building affordable housing in Cumberland County’s suburbs would give students of low-income families access to some of the best public schools in our state. Reducing income segregation in schools improves numerous measures of well-being for all involved. There’s an overwhelming body of empirical evidence showing that economic integration doesn’t just produce higher academic achievement across the board, but is in fact an exceptionally effective strategy when compared to those that simply allocate more resources to high-poverty schools."

Massachusetts -

• Time for New Bedford to better integrate its schools (New Bedford Light, Aug 9) - "The annual report of state’s Racial Imbalance Advisory Council recently showed that 10 New Bedford schools are currently classified as non-white segregated schools."
• A new report says some New Bedford schools are segregated. What can we learn from the city’s desegregation efforts of the 1970s and 80s?

Michigan -

• I thought my parents moved to Holly for the schools. I was wrong. (Detroit Free Press, Aug 19) - "On June 12, 1981, the Detroit Free Press declared: 'Busing Gets an A: Integration Is a Success in Ferndale.' If my parents had chosen to stay in their home, I would have started kindergarten in an integrated school."
• Created Equal: The Milliken v. Bradley decision’s effect on Detroit schools, 50 years later (WDET, Aug 7) - "Today on Created Equal, host Stephen Henderson was joined by three guests—Chalkbeat Detroit reporter Robyn Vincent, Detroit historian Ken Coleman, and Education Trust-Midwest Executive Director Amber Arellano—to talk about the Milliken ruling and its ripple effect on the Detroit public school system today."

Minnesota -

• Inequality, complacency behind Minnesota’s lagging student achievement, experts say (Minnesota Reformer, Aug 21) - "Another factor likely driving those gaps: rising levels of school segregation, especially in the Twin Cities. The state’s liberal open enrollment system, which allows parents to choose where they send their kids regardless of home address, appears to be increasing the racial homogeneity of schools."
• We are choosing to separate by race in Twin Cities schools (Star Tribune, Aug 10) - "School choice is available to all, and many pick schools where their kids look like everyone else. The economic effects on Minnesota are now playing out."

Mississippi -

• Seeking Real Change: South Jackson Combats Legacy of White Flight, Inequity and Blight (Mississippi Free Press, Aug 2) - “The whiteness of South Jackson began to shift after the U.S. Supreme Court declared school segregation unconstitutional in the 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education decision. But many white Mississippians resisted the change and ignored the ruling."

North Carolina -

• Student Wealth and Poverty Across Durham Public Schools, Mapped (Duke Research Blog, Aug 20) - “A new student assignment plan that Durham Public Schools is rolling out this year aims to combat that trend by redrawing district boundary lines—the thick black lines on the map—to make schools more diverse and equitable."
• Opinion: On public school desegregation, NC seems to be headed back to 1954 (Raleigh News and Observer, Aug 11) - "In our state and across the country, the tools maintaining this drive towards quasi-legalized segregation continue to be vouchers and charter school policies.If we work to fully integrate and equally fund our public schools, and remove the voucher system, we will see a positive impact on our society at large."

Ohio -

• Local schools still deeply segregated 70 years after Brown v. Board (Dayton Daily News, July 11) - “When the desegregation order was lifted in 2002—after a negotiated settlement with the NAACP—white enrollment in Dayton Public Schools had dropped to less than 27%. As noted above, it’s even lower today.

Texas -

• Texas lawmakers kick off a new season of heated debate over school vouchers (KUT News, Aug 12) - "'Since vouchers inception they have been a tool to promote racial segregation. So they first come about in terms of actual policy in the Jim Crow South,' DeMatthews said. He pointed to the 1950s, when it was pitched to Texans as a workaround for school desegregation."
• New National Park Site Spotlights School Segregation in Texas (Smithsonian Magazine, July 31) - "The Blackwell School was once Marfa’s only public school for Mexican and Mexican American students...Now, as the country’s newest national park site, the small, unassuming structure will help tell the often-overlooked story of how school segregation affected Hispanic communities."
• Historic Mexican American segregated school is now a national park

Virginia -

• Johnson Elementary gets new desegregation historical marker (WVIR, Aug 9) - "'This was an important desegregation suit led by a family that is still here and with us in Charlottesville,' said Smith. 'So, we would really like to be sure that the community understands the significance of this family, as well as this fight that they led to desegregate our Charlottesville schools.'"

CREED is accepting applications for its North Carolina Equity Fellowship, a professional learning opportunity that supports fellows in the design and implementation of individual projects that work to disrupt pressing educational inequities in North Carolina. This year, the fellowship is expanding with a new Learning Differences Fellow. Special Education teachers from across the state are encouraged to apply.

Applications must be submitted by Friday, September 6.

“Let us be dissatisfied until integration is not seen as a problem but as an opportunity to participate in the beauty of diversity.”

–Martin Luther King Jr., Where Do We Go From Here? speech, August 16, 1967, Atlanta, Georgia

Founded in 2009, the National Coalition on School Diversity is a cross-sector network of 50+ national civil rights organizations, university-based research centers, and state and local coalitions working to expand support for school integration. NCSD supports its members in designing, enacting, implementing, and uplifting PK-12 public school integration policies and practices so we may build cross-race/cross-class relationships, share power and resources, and co-create new realities.

NCSD MEMBERSHIP

NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund * Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund * American Civil Liberties Union * Poverty & Race Research Action Council * Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law * Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund * Magnet Schools of America * One Nation Indivisible * Southern Poverty Law Center * Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice at Harvard Law School * Civil Rights Project/Proyecto Derechos Civiles at UCLA * Campaign for Educational Equity, Teachers College, Columbia University * University of North Carolina Center for Civil Rights * Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at the Ohio State University * Othering & Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley * Education Rights Center, Howard University School of Law * Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity at the University of Minnesota Law School * Education Law Center * New York Appleseed * Sheff Movement Coalition * Voluntary Interdistrict Choice Corporation * ERASE Racism * Chicago Lawyers' Committee * Empire Justice Center * IntegrateNYC * Intercultural Development Research Association * Reimagining Integration: Diverse and Equitable Schools Project at the Harvard Graduate School of Education * Institute for Social Progress at Wayne County Community College District * Center on Law, Inequaliy and Metropolitan Equity at Rutgers Law School * Integrated Schools * The Office of Transformation and Innovation at the Dallas Independent School District * Live Baltimore * Maryland Equity Project at the University of Maryland College of Education * Center for Education and Civil Rights at Penn State College of Education * National Center for Montessori in the Public Sector * Diversity Education Network at Rutgers University * Being Black at School * UnifiEd * The Sillerman Center for the Advancement of Philanthropy * Public Advocacy for Kids * The Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the Transformation of Schools * The School Diversity Notebook * Fair Housing Justice Center, Inc. * Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity, Inc. (METCO) * Learn Together, Live Together * Beloved Community * Learning Policy Institute * Public School Forum of North Carolina * The Bell * North Carolina Justice Center * The Bridges Collaborative at The Century Foundation * SproutFive * Oneonta For Equality * NestQuest Houston * Metis Associates