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PAGE 14—FEBRUARY, 1963—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
MARYLAND
Baltimore Reports on
BALTIMORE
orty per cent of Baltimore’s
Negro teachers now serve on
“integrated faculties,” according
to statistical data released in Jan
uary by the Baltimore Depart
ment of Education. White mem
bers of the biracial staffs represent
63 per cent of the city’s white
principals and teachers, including
counselors, librarians and shop or
lab assistants.
Despite efforts of school officials to
persuade more white teachers to accept
assignment in Negro schools, there are
now more all-Negro staffs than when
school desegregation began. Schools
with all-Negro faculties numbered 67
at the start of the current school year,
in contrast to 64 in the 1954-55 school
year. The number of all-white school
staffs has dropped during the same pe
riod from 95 to 53.
In the statistical data, Baltimore is
recorded as having 200 school “facul
ties” but only 189 school staffs. The
difference lies in instances in which two
faculty units are combined under one
principal to form a single administrative
organization. Specifically: There are 11
elementary-secondary combinations in
which the secondary teachers are count
ed separately as “faculties” but are in
cluded with the elementary teachers in
the total of 189 school staffs.
Of the 189 school staffs, 69, or 37 per
cent, are biracial, while 67 are all-
Negro and 53 are all-white. The changes
since last year are a drop of five in all-
white staffs, a drop of one in all-Negro
staffs and a gain of nine biracial staffs.
Three schools have been added to the
system during the period. The number
of biracial school staffs has increased
steadily from the initial four recorded
in January, 1955 to the present 69.
Turning to the 200 “faculties,” as op
posed to combined school staffs, the fig
ures reveal that 69 are “integrated,” 61
are all-white and 70 are all-Negro. The
mixed faculties have 2,291 white and
1,193 Negro teachers for a total of 3,484,
which is more than half of the 6,625
public teachers and principals in Balti
more.
Although Negro pupils outnumber
white ones in the Baltimore school sys
tem, white teachers outnumber Negro
teachers by 3,659 to 2,966. Close to an
even balance is found at the elementary
level, where there are 1,775 white
Maryland Highlights
Forty per cent of Baltimore’s Negro
teachers and 63 per cent of its white
staff now serve on “integrated facul
ties,” the city’s Department of Edu
cation reported in January.
The number of adult Baltimore Ne
groes with four years of high school
education more than doubled be
tween 1950 and 1960, according to a
study by the Housing and Home
Finance Agency. But the majority of
both white and Negro residents over
age 24 were found to have had less
than a full high school education.
A study of high school dropouts
in Maryland found “lack of interest”
the most common reason given by
white and Negro boys and white girls.
Pregnancy was the most frequent
single reason (30 per cent of total)
among Negro girls.
School desegregation did not arise
as an issue during first weeks of the
Maryland General Assembly’s 90-
day session.
A state department official has cit
ed desegregation progress in Fred
erick County.
A Negro girl was elected to preside
over the Model Youth City Council
in Baltimore.
teachers and 1,712 Negro ones. On sec
ondary faculties there are 3,659 white
and 2,966 Negro teachers.
Staff desegregation has proceeded
more rapidly in the secondary and vo
cational schools (grades seven through
12) than in the lower grades. Thirty-
six out of 52 faculties on the secondary
level are biracial and include a large
majority of both the white and colored
secondary teachers (1,753 out of 1,884
white secondary faculty members; 849
out of 1,254 Negro secondary teachers).
Only four secondary units with 131 fac
ulty members remain all-white, while
405 Negro teachers serve on 12 all-
Negro secondary faculties.
On the elementary level, on the other
hand, only 33 out of 148 faculties are
racially mixed, leaving 57 all-white and
58 all-Negro. The majority of both
white and Negro elementary teachers
Missouri
(Continued from Page 12)
Schoolmen
Board Considers
Removing College
In early January, the St. Louis Board
of Education was reported to be con
sidering a proposal to shift its Harris
Teachers College from the crowded
West End area to the Vashon High
School building, which is an area that
has lost population because of slum
clearance for the Mill Creek Valley
urban redevelopment project.
Supt. of Instruction Philip J. Hickey
said the plan would save more than
$50,000 a year in costs now incurred for
transporting West End children by bus
to less crowded schools. Under the plan,
the teachers college building would be
converted to accommodate some 1,400
elementary school children, mostly Ne
groes.
St. Louis school officials also were
reported to be considering closing Har
ris Teachers College entirely when a
four-year branch of the University of
Missouri has been established at St.
Louis, as now contemplated. Harris
Teachers College, 106 years old, was the
first city teachers college established
west of the Mississippi River. Its opera
tion costs the Board of Education about
$400,000 a year.
Many Negro Residents
In recent years, the West End area
of St. Louis, formerly an all-white resi
dential area, has been the scene of a
massive influx of Negro residents'—in
cluding many from the razed Mill Creek
slum area. There has been a great in
crease in the number of school-age
children, and this has caused serious
overcrowding and other problems for
public schools.
The proposal to move the Harris
Teachers College was opposed by the
West End Community Conference, a
neighborhood group that has sought to
promote good race relations and main
tain property values in the area. Direc
tors of the conference, which includes
white and Negro members, said:
“The school board should consider
the obligation not to further segregation
by removing this institution with its
balanced integration of both faculty and
students. It should also consider the
school’s value as a public institution in
the model urban renewal conservation
program proposed for the West End.”
Legislative Action
University Branches
In Cities Proposed
Legislation to require the University
of Missouri to establish four-year
branches at both St. Louis and Kansas
City was introduced Jan. 15 by State
Rep. George H. Pace (Dem.) of Hanni
bal. A move to extend the university to
the state’s two major urban centers has
been advocated as a means of improv
ing the Missouri public higher educa
tion program, and specifically as a way
of making such education available to
students from low-income families in
cluding Negroes.
In an address to the newly convened
General Assembly at Jefferson City Jan.
2, Gov. John M. Dalton (Dem.) recom
mended a seven-point program to up
grade Missouri’s educational facilities,
standards and research. He proposed the
university branches and improved sup
port for the public junior college sys
tem initiated last year.
Most of the state’s Negroes live in the
two urban areas and are in the low-
income brackets. Both white and Negro
civic leaders and educators have viewed
the university extension plan as a way
of making it possible for a larger pro
portion of the state’s Negro young peo
ple to attend college.
The University of Missouri at Colum
bia, the Missouri School of Mines and
Metallurgy at Rolla, Lincoln Univer
sity at Jefferson City, and the state’s
five regional colleges are all desegre
gated but they are in relatively small
communities far removed from the two
major urban areas.
Biracial Faculties
I serve on one-race faculties: 1,237 of the
| 1,775 white elementary teachers are on
the 57 all-white faculties and 1,368 of
the 1,712 Negro elementary teachers are
on the 58 all-Negro faculties.
Under Survey
Negro Adults Show
Education Gains
The number of adult Baltimore Ne
groes with four years of high school
education more than doubled between
1950 and 1960, and the number with a
college education showed a correspond
ing gain, according to a study of 21
metropolitan areas released by the
Housing and Home Finance Agency in
Washington.
Despite the increases, the proportion
of the Baltimore population with less
than a full high school education re
mained high: 80 per cent of Baltimore
Negroes over 24 years of age and 63
per cent of white residents in the same
age bracket were found to have had
less than four years of high school. Ten
years earlier the percentages had stood
at 87 and 67, respectively.
Only three per cent of Negro adults
and eight per cent of whites were re
corded as having four years or more of
college education. The number of Ne
groes in this category rose from 3,265
to 6,301 in the 10-year period, while
the white increase was from 42,295 to
61,393.
Baltimore’s 80 per cent of adult Ne
groes with less than four years of high
school education was exceeded only by
Cincinnati (81 per cent), Atlanta (81
per cent) and New Orleans (85 per
cent). The lowest was Minneapolis with
59 per cent.
White Percentages
As a cross-section of small, medium
and large high schools in the state,
the sampling included 5,337 white boys.
4,031 white girls, 1,890 Negro boys and
1,773 Negro girls. Lack of interest was
given as the cause for about one-third
(35.3 per cent) of the dropouts, and
lack of scholastic achievement for an
other 18 per cent of the dropouts. The
third most prevalent reason (11 per
cent of dropouts) was cost of going to
school or other economic reasons.
Among other reasons were marriage
(9 per cent), pregnancy (5 per cent),
commitment to institution (4.5 per
cent), and military service (4.1 per
cent).
The leading reasons for dropouts
varied by sex and race:
White Boys
Lack of interest
41.3%
Lack of achievement
22.5
Economic factors
8.8
Military service
8.5
Misbehavior
8.5
Sent to institution
3.3
Negro Boys
Lack of interest
38.9%
Lack of achievement
21.0
Economic factors
15.0
Sent to institution
10.4
Military service
4.9
Socially maladjusted
3.3
White Girls
Lack of interest
30.4%
Marriage
26.9
Lack of achievement
12.9
Economic factors
9.8
Poor health
4.5
Pregnancy
4.2
Negro Girls
Pregnancy
29.5%
Lack of interest
23.1
Economic factors
16.9
Lack of achievement
11.6
Sent to institution
5.3
Poor health
4.7
Marriage
4.3
Baltimore’s 63 per cent of white
adults with less than a full high school
education was exceeded by none of the
other cities and equaled only by St.
Louis. Cities with more favorable white
percentages included New York, with
58 per cent; Boston, 46 per cent; At
lanta, 49 per cent; Dallas, 48 per cent;
Denver, 43 per cent, and Los Angeles,
46 per cent. Washington was lowest with
34 per cent.
As might be expected, Washington
led the nation in the white college cate
gory with 21 per cent of its white resi
dents over 24 years of age credited with
four or more years of college. Seven
per cent of its Negro adults were in the
same educational class. Among other
cities with relatively high percentages
were: Boston, 11 per cent white and 7
per cent Negro; Houston, 12 white and
5 Negro; Atlanta, 11 white and 4 Ne
gro; and Denver, 13 white and 8 Negro.
With eight per cent of its white
adults and three per cent of its Negro
adults having had four years of col
lege, Baltimore was exactly on a level
with Detroit. In two cities only two per
cent of Negroes were college graduates.
These were Buffalo and Pittsburgh. The
city with the highest proportion of its
Negroes having had college educations
was Minneapolis, with 10 per cent.
Large numerical gains in Negro in
come were recorded for Baltimore in
the past decade. The number earning
$3,000 to $4,000 a year rose from 6,775
to 26,948. The number in the $4,000-
$5,000 bracket jumped from 1,370 to
20,108. Those in the $5,000-$6,000 class
went from 390 to 9,546, while those
earning more than $6,000 went from 520
to 6,697. Income data was for the period
1949-1959. Despite the increases, more
than 60 per cent of Baltimore Negroes
continued to have incomes of less than
$3,000 a year.
The Housing and Home Finance
Agency distributed the data to docu
ment its findings that a rising Negro
middle class has an unmet housing
need. The agency will carry out the
federal open-occupancy housing policy.
Other reasons reported for dropouts
were: parental indifference, 2.5 per cent
of the total sample; emotionally dis
turbed, 2.1 per cent, and lack of suitable
program, 1.4 per cent. The study is
being continued.
Miscellaneous
Negro Girl Named
To Model Council
A Negro girl was elected by fellow
students, most of them white, to pre
side over the Model Youth City Council
at Baltimore City Hall, Jan. 29-30.
A student at the Carver Vocational-
Technical Senior High School, Stella
Louise Spears achieved the title of
“president” of the
model legislative
body through the
voting of 120 stu
dents participating
in a program on
municipal govern
ment at six Balti
more high schools,
four of them pre
dominantly white.
At a pre-legis
lative conference
the student candi
dates for the top-ranking model offices
were called upon to give oral presenta
tions as a prelude to the voting. Miss
Spears received the highest number of
votes on the basis of her presentation,
which won her the top post of presi
dent. The runner-up in the voting be
comes “Mayor,” a position won last year
by a Negro girl and this year by a white
boy, Abraham Hertzberg.
In its 10th year under the sponsor
ship of the Baltimore public schools,
the Model Youth City Council is the
highlight of a program to encourage
active participation in government.
Legislative Activity
MISS SPEARS
State Pupil Study Shows
Most Dropouts at Age 16
A pupil drop-out study by the Mary
land Department of Education has
found that the largest percentage of
dropouts left school at age 16, and that
almost exactly half of them (49.8 per
cent) were average or above average in
mental ability.
Based on a high school sampling, the
study showed that slightly more than
half of the dropouts were under
achieving in terms of their ability, and
almost half had failed three or more
subjects in their last marking period,
by which time their attendance was ir
regular. Yet one-fourth of them had
no failures.
School Segregation
Issue Missing
From Legislature
The Maryland General Assembly
neared the end of the first month of its
90-day general session without the issue
of school segregation-desegregation be
ing raised. No bills touching on the
issue had been introduced, not even
routine housekeeping bills to remove
references to white and colored in pre-
1954 school laws.
State Sen. Verda F. Welcome, who,
in her previous position as a member
Louisiana
(Continued from Page 13)
Also at the Jan. 14 session, Ellis,
attending his first board meeting since
his appointment in December by Gov.
Jimmie Davis, presented each member
a letter stating a proposal he will bring
up at the next meeting. It is that the
board defer decision on its $11.6 million
school consruction and renovation pro
gram until certain questions involving
segregation and nuclear fallout protec
tion can be resolved.
Ellis asked that the building program
be postponed until a comprehensive
survey is made to evaluate it in light
of federal court orders directing the
board to re-arrange its administrative
set up in September “without regard
to race.”
The district court last year directed
the school board to establish a single
administrative unit for the desegregated
first and second grades, where white
and Negro districts formerly existed,
“and for other grades as hereafter de
segregated.”
Ellis said this requirement might
seriously affect the location of new
schools.
Clashed Sharply
At the next meeting Ellis clashed
sharply with other board members
when his motions again died for lack
of a second. He strongly recommend
ed delaying the building program in
light of the transition from segregated
to desegregated schools and again pro
posed a study of the end of co-educa
tion “on the premise as to ‘how’ this
can be done in September, 1963, not ‘if
it can be done.”
Ellis argued that speed is necessary
because the legal situation might change
suddenly, requiring desegregation at a
faster pace than is now scheduled. He
also said the separation of students
by sex holds promise of direct benefits
to education, aside from its segrega
tionist appeal.
However, board president Sutherland
said that a comprehensive study is im
perative and that Ellis’s motion, if
adopted, would have the effect of
bringing prompt and thorough desegre
gation to a school like Francis W.
Gregory Junior High.
Sutherland added that several years
of study had preceded the beginning
of co-operation in New Orleans pub
lic schools and that a thorough study
would be required to end it.
W hat They Say
Urban League Notes
‘Impressive Gains
Desegregation of public and private
schools in New Orleans has resulted
in hardly a ripple in race relations
here, said J. Harvey Kerns, executive
director of the New Orleans Urban
League in a year-end report.
“In spite of changes, we have no*
experienced the bitter violence which
has accompanied similar changes &
the region,” he added.
Impressive gains for Negroes were
made in the area of employment, Kerns
reported. “Negro engineers, chemists-
accountants, stenographers are becom
ing more generally accepted by l ea “”
ing industrial, business and govern
mental agencies,” he asserted.
However, he saw a continuing thre a
to racial harmony in what he term
legislative bias with special referen
to civil rights.
In another report, Kerns said ^
Urban League has detemined that tt>
principal factors affecting the behavm
problems of Negro youth in New y 1
leans are the inadequacy of recreate
and the lack of opportunities for chat
acter development.
These conclusions were based on
three-month study, “Recreational a®
Character Building Needs for New
leans Negroes,” conducted by K e ^
with the assistance of 20 students
the St. Augustine High School.
of the House of Delegates, had regute*
sought the removal of racial referen _
in school laws, said in a mid-JaB ’
interview that she had no school loe 15
lation in mind for this session.
Mrs. Welcome said that the state ^
perintendent of schools, Thomas
Pullen Jr., had told her that the sec ^
of the Maryland code pertaining^
schools was being rewritten and ^
the references to white and co o
would be eliminated. This would sa
her, she indicated. j 0
An issue that may be consider ^
have some racial undertones is an ^
ministration program to convert ^
five state teachers colleges to b ^
arts institutions and to place them a ?
with Morgan State College un
Maryland Board of State Colleges. ..
gan, a predominantly Negro colleg >
fighting to preserve its autonomy-
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