Description
Book SynopsisStill Failing: The Continuing Paradox of School Desegregation is a significantly updated and revised version of Caldas and Bankston’s previous book Forced to Fail: The Paradox of School Desegregation. The book includes an analysis of the most significant Supreme Court cases that have been decided in the ten years since the first edition of the book appeared. The authors consider the important implications of these recent rulings for the future of school desegregation in America’s schools. Social capital theory is used to explain why schools and communities continue to be segregated along racial and ethnic lines. Still Failing also provides the most recent U.S. census and Department of Education statistics documenting the continuing segregation of American schools and districts. The book also continues to track the persistent racial achievement gap, using the newest ACT, SAT, and NAEP testing figures. Finally, the book considers what present segregation trends portend for future efforts to racially and ethnically integrate schools, and close achievement gaps. Additional key features of this book include: •Historical antecedents showing how and why American schooling became racially segregated •Social capital theory to explain school and community segregation •The legal history of all important supreme court cases, congressional laws and presidential executive orders related to school segregation and desegregation •Easy-to-read and interpret graphs and figures •The most up-to-date school population and census information
Trade ReviewStill Failing reveals America’s daunting reality of the persistent racial gap in academic achievement despite decades of judicial actions on school desegregation. Critical of top-down social engineering, the authors offer an alternative account to explain why desegregation still fails to meet its intended goal, guiding readers toward a better understanding of how race, class, and social networks influence educational outcomes and help them envision a more realistic approach to equal access to educational opportunities. -- Min Zhou, Tan Lark Sye Chair Professor of Sociology at Nanyang Technological University and co-author of The Asian American Achievement Paradox
Table of ContentsContents Chapter 1 — School Desegregation: Irrelevant Public Policy? The Continuing Racial and Socioeconomic Segregation of American Schools Resegregation by the Numbers Failure of Will or Failure of Command and Control? Redistributing Children’s “Social Capital” The Fallacy of “Diversity” Unintended Consequences A Noble, Misguided Vision Blinders of Moral Commitment Chapter 2 — How Did We Get Here? The Long Legal Road The Genesis of Civil Rights The Paradox of Slavery in Free Market Society Reconstruction and the Origins of “Affirmative” Protection of Group Rights Retreat from Reconstruction and the Protection of Group Rights Plessy v. Ferguson and “Separate but Equal” The Era of Jim Crow and American “Apartheid” Black Grass Roots Resistance to “Separate but Equal” The Earthquake of Brown I Grass Roots Civil Rights Struggle A Return to Reconstruction The Desegregation Battle Intensifies A Sea Change of Civil Rights Freedom of Choice “Affirmative” Action Maximum Federal Involvement Chapter 3—Desegregation Expansion—and Limits Setting Limits Unitary Status and the End of Oversight The Diversity Doctrine and Supreme Court Schizophrenia The Future of Desegregation Litigation Chapter 4 — The Demographic Transformation of America A Changing Society Family Structure Demographic Change: New Student Populations Hispanic Explosion The Asian Advantage The Problem of Poverty Demographics and School Desegregation Chapter 5 – It takes “a certain” Kind of Village to Raise a Child What is Social Capital? Families, Schools and Communities: Social Capital and School Environments Social Capital in Child and Parent Interactions Social Capital in Parent-to-Parent Interactions Social Capital in Parent and School Interactions Social Capital in Student-to-Student Interactions The Power of School Peer Cultures Chapter 6 – The Power of School Peers and the Power of Community The Positive Power of Peers Disruptive School Climates Schools and the Creation of Community Social Capital Desegregation and the Destruction of Community Social Capital Understanding the Importance of Community Chapter 7 — School Desegregation and the Racial Achievement Gap A Controversial Topic Is There Really a Gap? The SAT/ACT Gap The High School Gap The Higher Ed Gap Why the Continuing Gap? The Origins of the Black-White Gap History of Racial Oppression as Cause of the Black/White Achievement Gap Environmental Hazards and Educational Achievement School Curriculum Stereotype Threat Why the Need for School Racial Integration? Do Blacks Achieve Better in Majority White Schools? Is White Achievement Hurt in Majority Black Schools? Are Standardized Tests Culturally Biased Against Minorities? The Stubborn Gap How Can We Close the Gap? Chapter 8 — A New Perspective of Race and Schooling: Attaining the Dream New Paradigms Resistance Socioeconomic Integration Strategies that Work Neighborhood Schools Strengthening Communities Public Support for Public Education Local Control in Minority Communities Approach Reforms with Caution and Limited Expectations Let Schools Be Schools
