A Stranger in Two Worlds

  • Segregation declined throughout the United States, especially in the South, between 1970 and 2000. However, the decline in segregation within school districts was partially offset by a growing degree of racial separation between school districts.
  • White school personnel used policies such as curriculum tracking and special-education referrals such as a means of sorting students by race under the guise of “ability grouping” or meeting students “special needs”.
  • Today segregation remains a fact of life in our nation’s schools.
  • Findings confirm the fallacy of equating integration with quality.
  • We must not abandon integration as a goal, but it is utopian to believe that schools alone can close an achievement gap that is the result of deeper economic and social inequalities.