Racial #discrimination and injustice: a battle the world has been battling for decades. Even in the 21st century, the United States and alternative parts of the world still cannot find a certain cure for this social disease.
The United States is one of the most diverse countries in the world, but while looking closer, there are many places, such as New York State, infamous for its segregated neighborhoods. Racist policies are still evident in the state, and the schools in New York remain a question regarding desegregation of schools.
In the United States, more than half of students are in racially concentrated districts, which comprise more than 75% of the students who are white or non-white. These more segregated schools receive significantly less funding than their less segregated counterparts.
In 1964, thousands of white parents gathered in Manhattan to protest against school desegregation in New York. The white protestors claimed they occupied a higher level of citizenship than Black and Puerto Rican New Yorkers. Some senators condemned the Civil Rights Act as it treated school segregation differently in different regions. Some condemned it by saying that no court or official in the United States could issue any order seeking to achieve a racial balance in any school by requiring the transportation of pupils or students.
Meanwhile, reminiscent of the 1960’s white resistance to busing, some parents that protested integration plans did so because they believed it would jeopardize their child’s current school enrollment. Parents feared that their children would lose a spot at a coveted school and would have to choose a low-performing school. Abolishing century-old racial injustice practices is not a simple task, and some white parents even threatened to quit the public school system if the plan didn’t benefit them.
The court recognized the educational benefits of racially diverse classrooms. Still, it failed to achieve any concrete results while implying the strategies for desegregation cannot be justified with any universal law because it was a question of demographics. The court admitted that the programs were insufficient to achieve the academic benefits and ruled the plans unconstitutional.
School desegregation that resulted from gentrification would fail a social justice standard, even though it would still produce the benefits of a racially diverse classroom. In the long term, it would create more disharmony than before. Desegregation is impossible without winning the trust and confidence of both sides, and without any solid plan, it will forever be a question of debate.
Instead of integrating schools to improve student outcomes, integrate communities and housing plans because of the moral obligation to redress centuries of oppression to historically marginalized people.
