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SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—MARCH, 1965—PAGE 13
SHAPING EDUCATIONAL POLICY'
Conant’s Recent Book Discusses Education
[ James Bryant Conant’s latest book,
Shaping Educational Policy, one of
t he Carnegie Series in American
Education published by McGraw-
Hill, includes a section on “The Edu-
' cation of the Negro” in its chapter
on “Policy Making for the Public
Schools.” Here are major portions of
the section (reprinted by permis
sion) with subheads added:
Until recently all concerned with
shaping policy for elementary and sec
ondary education have either ignored
the subject of Negro education or ac
cepted completely segregated schools
as a matter of course. We have talked
about our public school system and how
it responds to and is conditioned by all
types of groups and social classes ex
cept the Negro.
Consider for example, how all of us
who have written in praise of the com
prehensive high school have turned
our backs on the obvious exception to
the definition of such a school. A com
prehensive high school is a school in
which all the youth of an area attend
the same school, or so we have often
said. . . . But neither I nor anyone else,
as far as I am aware, has underlined
the fact that in the former Confederate
States no comprehensive high schools
have ever existed. . . .
The members of the establishment
have been as silent as any of us as to
the limitation on the concept of the
comprehensive high school as an in
strument of democracy. . . . The state
organizations of teachers in the former
Confederate States have developed on
' the tacit assumption that the schools
were segregated and would remain
segregated for the foreseeable future.
Only within the last few years have
voices been raised within the NEA
to question the complete separation of
Negro and white teachers in profes
sional organizations. Not even a mixed
administrative group tries to develop
a joint policy at the state capitals in
the former Confederate States.
Teacher Education
In all the discussions of Negro educa
tion that have appeared in the last ten
years very little reference has been
made to the edu
cation of teachers
in the Southern
states. I was not
fully aware of the
complete separa
tion of Negro and
white teachers in
these states until I
visited Virginia,
Georgia, Florida,
North Carolina,
and Texas in con
nection with my
study of the education of American
teachers. We spent a considerable
amount of time visiting completely
segregated Negro colleges of education
or Negro liberal arts colleges from
which a high percentage of the gradu
ates became teachers. . . . The state
1 au thorities had provided excellent phy
sical facilities for the most part, at least
® the state colleges I visited. The pro-
lessors were dedicated educators keenly
( alive to the implication of the educa
tional revolution. But the human limi
tation because of the nature of the
student body was discouraging. Boys
^d girls who had lived all their lives
111 a completely segregated small com
munity in a society dominated by white
People and had graduated from a seg-
re gated Negro high school were ill pre
pared to undertake college work. . . .
^he influence of the socio-economic
situation, the lack of family and com-
munity interest in reading books, mag-
az * * ne s, and even papers, and above all
I *he blocks to ambition, a consequence
°f the segregated policy of society, had
! 80 handicapped these youngsters from
start that only a very few could
< re ach the levels of accomplishment in
ac ademic subjects expected of students
111 a nonsegregated college. These few
j Usua lly went North or West to a
Uruver sity to do graduate work. The
were graduated as teachers for
( e Negro elementary and secondary
Jools. They returned with as much
Lrun § as conscientious professors
C ° Ul d provide but without the kind of
l °mp. ehension of many fields of learn-
T® which I, for one, would specify for
On tea °^ ers ‘ Through no fault of any
( ^dividual, but as a consequence
^ the system, these less-than-satisfac-
teachers returned to the far-less-
( 'Satisfactory school. The vicious
ael continued to revolve.
. . . There is no need to underline the
tragedy of Negro education in a segre
gated state. It is sufficient if the kind
of information I have just given is
realized both North and South. For too
long discussion has been silenced by all
educators and all state teachers organ
izations, Negro and white alike. The
reader will bear in mind I have been
writing about the education of the
Negro in the segregated states. And that
such states exist and are different from
the other states is a fact that needs
underlining in any rational discussion
of what is the most serious political-
educational problem facing the United
States today.
Long-Range Solution
Requires Analysis
I am well aware that in recent years
the leaders in the movement to create
something like equal opportunities for
Negroes have tended to blur the dis
tinction between the Negro schools in
segregated states and the all-Negro
schools in states where some mixed
schools do in fact exist. I venture to
think that for the long-run solution
of the problem this tendency is a mis
take, because what is needed to solve
the general problem—admittedly a na
tional problem—of adequate education
for the Negro is a state-by-state analy
sis and a state-by-state decision.
In terms of social prejudice, in terms
of justice to an individual, in terms of
social consequences the completely
Negro school in a Northern or Western
state may be as bad as a segregated
school in a segregated state. But the
approach to a long-range eradication of
the two evils must depend on a realistic
analysis of the factors involved, and
they are as different as the histories of
the two types of segregated schools.
In the practically completely segregated
Southern states, in which there are
separate Negro and white state teachers
associations, there have never been any
mixed schools. In the states in which
there are today what are called de facto
segregated schools, all-Negro schools
are a relatively recent development. In
these states there are mixed schools
and school systems with mixed staffs.
The state authorities, with perhaps
some exceptions, have declared that the
schools should be open to all irrespec
tive of color. Let us consider what is
needed in such states to get forward
with a mitigation of the present almost
unbearable situation.
The first matter to be attended to is
the formulation of a state policy, The
issue should be transferred from the
THE REGION
(Continued from Page 1)
of school districts, were: Louisiana, 4
of 67; Mississippi, 22 of 150; South
Carolina, 42 of 108; Virginia, 70 of 130.
North Carolina was the only South
ern state that did not report any count
or estimate on the number of districts
in compliance. State education officials
said they had not counted the forms
received. However, J. E. Miller, as
sistant state superintendent of public
instruction, said he was “not aware of
any county or city board of education
in North Carolina that does not plan
to submit some type of document of
compliance.”
Districts Refusing
The four districts refusing to sign
compliance statements included one in
Alabama that planned to file a suit
testing the legality of the HEW regu
lations and the compliance form. The
Bessemer, Ala., school board announced
it had retained an attorney for this
purpose. The other districts rejecting
future federal aid were Plaquemines
and Vermilion parishes, La., and
Wilkinson County, Miss.
Gov. Paul B. Johnson of Mississippi
reportedly had prepared plans for a
test suit to be filed on behalf of an
individual school district, but this
could not be confirmed.
These were the major points of con
fusion that complicated the submission
of compliance agreements:
• Forms: The form signed by state
agencies numbers eight pages in length
and is called “Statement of Compli
ance.” Individual districts had as one
local level and the courts as far as
possible. The state, by legislative reso
lution or by the action of a powerful
and respected state board, should de
clare that the public schools as far as
possible should be comprehensive
schools. The chief state school officer
should be directed to proceed to report
what steps, however radical, would be
required to reduce to a minimum the
number of noncomprehensive schools,
both elementary and secondary. A mo
ment’s consideration makes it plain that
whether or not a given school is mixed
or essentially all-Negro depends on its
neighborhood. A recognition of this
basic fact, of course, has led in the past
to the gerrymandering of attendance
lines within a district by some local
boards so that in fact some schools
would be all-white, others all-Negro.
Looked at from the point of view of
those who wish to have the maximum
number of truly comprehensive schools
(i.e., mixed schools), a radical redis
tricting in some sections of some states
would be highly desirable. It could
change the balance of Negro and white
families in many school districts.
Such a measure as the redrawing of
district lines to insure a mixed popula
tion within each district is perhaps too
radical to be practical, but the possi
bility should be faced square nonethe
less. . . .
School Districting Power
Must be Examined Clearly
Of course, any redistricting must
carry with it proposals for financing
and managing the schools, and the in
herent difficulties are very great. Yet
setting forth the consequences of such
a radical approach, and also the failure
to adopt such a recommendation, would
do much to clarify a fundamental issue.
For there can be no question that as
long as families within a state are free
to establish essentially segregated resi
dential areas that may correspond to
state-created school districts, it may be
impossible to have mixed schools. I
conclude therefore that one must recog
nize that the power of the state to
establish school districts is a funda
mental fact that must be brought out
into the open, and state policy in regard
to the school districts therefore must
be examined and clearly stated.
Such an examination should be made
state by state and debated in the legis
lature eventually. Those who reject the
radical proposal to redistrict the state
to provide for the maximum number
choice the signing of a one - page,
standard form entitled “Assurance of
Compliance,” which is the HEW-441.
• Deadlines: Originally the U. S.
Commissioner of Education, Francis
Keppel, said in his memorandum to
chief state school officers that their
“Statement of Compliance” was to be
completed, signed and returned to his
office “no later than March 4, 1965.”
The office later said that this date was
not a final deadline but a “target date.”
The federal agency has not set a dead
line or “target date” for the submission
of compliance plans by the individual
districts. However, June 30 is the end
of the fiscal year and presumably
each district would have to decide
before then in order to obtain federal
aid for the fiscal year starting July 1.
Office of Education officials were
quoted as saying that aid money will
be lost for good by a district if it fails
to comply by the time the funds are
distributed.
• Compliance: Most segregated dis
tricts apparently have signed the short
“Assurance of Compliance” instead of
submitting a voluntary plan as to how
they would desegregate. Officials from
the Office of Education later clarified
their instructions to restrict this form
for use only by school districts com
pletely desegregated at the time of
signing. Indications are that the form
will be returned to segregated districts
that signed them, and the districts will
be asked to submit a desegregation
plan.
• Types of aid: The compliance
agreement covers 12 federal aid pro
of mixed schools might come up with
an alternative state policy. It might be
as follows: assuming the present school
districts, the state should adopt the
principle that every school within a
given district should be a mixed school,
the composition of which should cor
respond to the composition of the entire
district ( in terms of the percentage of
Negroes and whites). Of course, the
application of this principle would re
sult in a great variety of mixed schools.
I can think of some where all the
schools would be 90 per cent white and
others in which all the schools would
be 90 per cent Negro. Yet if one is
looking for a statewide principle and
is an advocate of as many mixed
schools as possible, such a principle has
much to recommend it and could be
relatively easily enforced by state au
thorities.
Transportation of Pupils
Would Present Difficulty
One difficulty with either of the two
proposals I have just discussed is that
in many areas, pupils would have to
be transported some distance. Negro
children and white children both
would have to take buses, because the
residential patterns would rarely cor
respond to the pattern of the whole
district; many present neighborhood
schools would have to be transformed.
Now the concept of the neighborhood
school is almost as dear to most Ameri
can public school people as the principle
of the comprehensive high school. In
both cases educational considerations be
come mixed with political and sociolog
ical arguments. The same kind of argu
ments are used to support both public
neighborhood schools and public com
prehensive high schools. These are the
arguments many of us have often used
against the use of taxpayers’ money to
support private schools. The children
from different homes should go to
school together. Separate schools based
on religion or income or social standing
of parents are a divisive force in our
society.
Neighborhood School Concept
So the argument goes. But notice how
the concept of the neighborhood school
emerges: the school’s atmosphere feeds
back to the families; the mingling of
the children from different socio
economic levels affects the spirit of the
neighborhood. The community and the
school interact together. If every neigh
borhood were a cross section of the
American population, the conflict of
goals between neighborhood schools
and mixed schools would not exist. As
a matter of fact, neighborhoods corre-
grams, involving equipment acquisi
tion; guidance, counseling and testing;
educational statistics service; several
vocational training programs; work-
study programs; Manpower Develop
ment and Training programs; Area
Redevelopment Act training programs;
adult basic education programs; public
library services and construction; and
educational improvement for handi
capped children and youth.
Before a district in compliance can
be approved to receive federal aid,
the state agency concerned must have
been approved for all the programs
receiving money through the U.S. Of
fice of Education. The exception is
impacted-area aid, which is made di
rectly to the district, and for this only
the individual district need be in com
pliance. Federal aid for school lunches
is specifically excluded from the en
forcement provisions, and this money
can be granted to segregated schools.
• Enforcement: Title VI of the 1964
Civil Rights Act requires a complex
procedure before any federal funds can
be withheld from districts or institu
tions not in compliance. The process
includes public hearings, notification
to Congress followed by a 30-day
waiting period, review by the U. S.
Secretary of Health, Education and
Welfare, and, finally, opportunities for
a district to take legal action to appeal,
the withholding of money. HEW of
ficials have said, however, that this
complicated procedure was needed
only to “withdraw” money already
granted, and that it would not be re
quired when the agency decided not
to renew grants.
Survey Shows 2,015 Agreements
of Negroes
spond to residential patterns that re
flect differences in the socio-economic
level of the families, and in the case
of Negroes reflect the prejudices of a
vast number of white families. His
torically the elementary public school
has been a neighborhood school and
there are strong arguments for its con
tinuing to be a neighborhood school. ...
Yet there can be no doubt that be
cause of the segregated residential
patterns in almost all cities and towns
in all states, North and South, the
neighborhood school is often either 100
per cent white or 100 per cent Negro.
In terms of a cross section of the entire
school district, the neighborhood school
is thus often not a comprehensive
school. What is to be done about such
a situation if the present school dis
tricts are to be maintained? This ques
tion is critical in the large cities today.
My own answer would be, as a last
resort after all readjustment of attend
ance lines had failed to provide enough
mixed schools, to be prepared to bus
high school students in such numbers
and in such a way that each high school
would be as comprehensive as the total
school district. The elementary schools
I should leave as neighborhood schools
even if many were as a consequence
essentially all-Negro. But ... I should
advocate pouring money into such
schools with the hope of overcoming
the incredible handicaps under which
children in the Negro slum schools now
suffer. But my views on this subject are
for the purposes of this book neither
here nor there. The point is the state
should adopt a clear-cut detailed policy
at the highest level. If drastic district
reorganization is out of the question
(such as combining slum areas of a
city with nearly suburban independent
school districts), then the specifications
to the school boards about attendance
lines, busing pupils, and the composi
tion of the school staffs should be made
quite clear.
Public Opinion Determines
Ease of Developing Policy
I have written about the development
by public debate of a state policy in the
nonsegregated states. I have done so
because the problems in these states in
theory are easiest to solve. For, theo
retically, public opinion in the non
segregated states would be ready to
accept some such general principle as
“the greater the number of mixed
schools, the better.” The political re
sistance in the segregated states pre
sents another problem. Public opinion
might well split on a fundamental
issue, which I believe would finally
come down to accepting the principle
of the comprehensive school or abolish
ing all public schools within the state.
Although I shall not pursue this par
ticular problem further, I should point
out as a practical matter that if one of
the present segregated states were to
adopt the principle of the comprehen
sive school, two important details would
have to be examined in full. One would
be the gradual integration of the present
completely separate teaching staffs, the
other the timing of the transformation
of the schools in different school dis
tricts. The discussion of the various
alternative of resolving the conflict of
aims between a comprehensive school
and a neighborhood school in the pre
ceding pages would be applicable to the
segregated states once the state had
accepted the principle of comprehen
sion and worked out a time schedule
for its adoption, district by district, over
the next twenty years.
Summing Up Discussion
To sum up this discussion on policy
for our public schools, it seems clear
that so far neither the establishment
nor the state educational administrative
hierarchy has faced up to the problem
of segregated schools. The educators
alone cannot possibly formulate policy
in this area, but they can help. State
by state certain basic issues should be
faced, state by state a policy should be
hammered out, and lay opinion here
would be far more important than the
views of educators. Superficially an
educational issue seems to be at stake.
What is really involved, however, is a
deep-seated pattern of racial discrimi
nation as expressed in housing and in
employment. An educational policy can
either reinforce racial prejudice or try
to mitigate its evil influence. The com
prehensive high school is designed for
the latter purpose; alone it cannot solve
the basic problem, but each state that
sets it up as an ideal and then strives
toward it will be moving in the right
direction. One cannot expect every
state to set up in the same timetable,
but each state ought to face the issue.