Dem lawmaker says U.S. has ‘drifted backwards’ on school integration

Education and the Workforce Committee Chairman Bobby Scott (D-Va.) warned Friday that diversity and integration in public schools is drifting backwards.

“Sixty-five years ago today the court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that separate educational opportunities are inherently unequal and for several decades after 1954, the court aggressively pursued a policy to require integrating the public schools,” Scott told Hill.TV.

“But about 30 years ago, that trend ended and we started a new trend towards more segregated schools,” he continued. “Schools right now are as segregated as they were in the 1960s and this is because of Supreme Court rulings, some legislative action but basically we’ve just drifted backwards.”

Scott joined “Rising” to mark the 65th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, the historic Supreme Court ruling that declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional.

Despite the ruling, a new study released last week by The Civil Rights Project at UCLA found that segregation in schools has continued to grow over the last three decades.

According to the report, white students on average attend a school in which 69 percent of the students are white. African American students account for 15 percent of student enrollment nationwide, but typically attend schools that are 47 percent black.

—Tess Bonn