Brown V. The Board Of Education Essay

Sixty-two years ago, through Brown v. The Board of Education of Topeka, the Supreme Court determined that separate was not equal and since that decision, “the only tried, tested, and cost-effective solution to unequal and inadequate education is integrated education.” (Black 2013) Armed with the knowledge that ethnic, academic, and economic stratification still exists throughout the educational system in the United States the debate can shift away from whether school choice is good or bad to how we can better meet the goals of public education with broader school choice in place. School choice programs generally focus on the individual rather than society as a whole, potentially undermining the public education goals of social mobility and social cohesion. In order to justify the use

(Black 2013) It is obvious that integrated schools improve education for low-income and minority students, so the solutions to the stratification issues we face should include, (1) helping all parents understand diversity provides benefits to everyone and (2) developing and supporting policies that promote diversity, while maintaining individual choice to a degree. To address the issue of helping parents understand the importance of diversity, schools should utilize the increased marketing that has come with more choice. Instead of focusing entirely on the fiscal bottom line or test scores, schools could explain that critical thinking and better preparation for a multicultural world with its global economy are some of the benefits of integrated schools, areas white students are currently lacking in. (Black 2013) Many school districts have implemented policies to integrate their schools. One example is in Cambridge, Mass where every school is a magnet school. Parents make a choice and the district looks at the free and reduced lunch eligibility as a factor in the final