This Saturday marks the 60th anniversary of Brown v. Board
of Education, this landmark ruling struck down school segregation and marked a
major turning point in the civil rights movement. For African-American’s this
meant that we could be afforded the same educational opportunities as our Caucasian counterparts,
right? Wrong. Although that’s what Brown v. Board of Education set out to do,
in many situations and in many inner cities it did just the opposite. President
Obama admits that we still have issues of segregation within our education
system. President Obama was quoted as saying, "we must continue striving
toward equal opportunities for all our children, from access to advanced
classes to participation in the same extracurricular activities," Obama
wrote. "Because when children learn and play together, they grow, build, and
thrive together."
You can either agree
or disagree, but the facts are on the table. In larger inner cities where there
is a higher concentration of minorities many students are moved from one
failing school to another. Then you have this aspect of gentrification, where a
large influx of higher salaried and educated people move into these declining
neighborhoods leading to property taxes being raised and the poor being forced
out. So where are these people forced to go? It’s simple, to another declining
neighborhood where they can afford to live that has an equally declining school
system. Many inner city schools lack the
proper funding, and many extracurricular programs are forced to be dropped. Many of these extracurricular programs such as
art, music, and/or sports are the reason many inner city students flourish in
schools. When we take this programs out of the schools we lose talents, what I
mean by this is many students don’t find school appealing anymore they give up
on their talent of playing piano, because without the music class at school
they would not be able to afford the lessons.
On the surface many typically do not think about whether
schools are segregated or whether every child is afforded the same education as
a child living in a school district where all the houses are $500,000 plus, but
this is something that we (by “we” I mean our minority population) need to step
up and fight for equality within our school systems, especially in our inner
cities. These kids do not deserve to get these inexperienced teachers, lack of
funding which leads to the cutting of many programs. They deserve to have nice
classrooms, with up to date textbooks, everyone issued a brand new Apple IPad
to do their work on, and the opportunity to play lacrosse if their heart
desires (amongst other things).
In 2013, the NationalAssessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) took a selected group of 12th
graders in order to see if they were at or above the “Proficient” level for
Mathematics and Reading. In both subjects Blacks and Hispanics (minorities) had
a drastically lower percentage and were not deemed at or above the “Proficient”
level as their Asian and White counterparts. Could this be as a result of the
minority groups not understanding the material (which goes back to the school
system and its teachers)? Or maybe an issue of less minority parents completing
the high school level, which would put them in a better position to help their
children? Either way, the gap in the inequalities of education received among students within the United States is at an all-time high. It seems as if
history is either repeating itself or this generation has never stood up to the
rights which were granted to us in the Brown v. Board of Education decision. Change will only come if we continue to voice
our opinion in numbers versus sitting back and allowing this landmark case to
dwindle between the cracks.
So I have to ask, how far do you think we've come since the
landmark decision?
Britt Daise
Urban Echelon Magazine & Blogspot
Twitter: thisisbee
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