School segregation Essay Example for Free

School segregation Essay As I walk through our schools and communit people living and socializing where they feel it is most affordable and comfortable. Individuals in society live to their own standards, producing their own living conditions. I was interested in writing about how the racial segregation came about in America at first. However, I noticed that the topic is too broad and after reading several articles regarding racial segregation in America, I noticed how interesting that this racial issue have caused an effect to the education system around the states. Schools around the United States are getting more and more heavily segregated by different races which could also cause an imbalance of income groups. For example, in New York City, we can see that the majority of the black people or minorities would prefer to live in areas such as Harlem or Brooklyn which relatively have a lower cost of living compared to Manhattan or downtown. Educational segregation was once widely viewed as a result of white racism. Roberts v. Boston was the first case to challenge segregation in public schools. In  this case, five-year-old Sarah Roberts was barred from her local primary school because she was black, and was forced to travel a great distance to get to school every morning. Her father sued the city of Boston to allow his daughter to attend a school in their neighborhood. The case was heard by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court on Dec. 4, 1849. The following April, the court ruled that school segregation was constitutional. However, the fight to end public school segregation did not end there. This example shows that educational segregation had been  around for a long time and it is not getting any better. Besides that, it is known that public schools in one of the most racially diverse states in the country, New York are the most highly segregated, with minority and poor students increasingly isolated by race and class, according to a new report released by a civil rights policy group at the University of California, Los Angeles. The proportion of Latino and Asian students in the state of New York nearly doubled from 1989 to 2010, but their exposure to white students in public schools decreased during that time, the report said. And as minority student populations increased, the proportion of low-income students in those minority-majority public schools also rose, making the schools â€Å"severely segregated† in terms of both race and class, according to the report. This means that the children who most depend on the public schools for any chance in life are concentrated in schools struggling with all the dimensions of family and neighborhood poverty and isolation. Imagine how unfair the opportunities that these students could have gotten. Based on the Department of Education statistics looking at public  school enrollment in New York City within the past 20 years, it is found that while nearly 50 percent of public school students in New York state are considered low-income, black and Latino students tend to enroll at schools where about 70 percent of students are low-income, while white students attend schools where 30 percent of students are low-income. What’s more, the proportion of black students attending public schools considered â€Å"intensely segregated† which is define as having a student body that’s less than 10 percent white is on the rise. For example,  the country’s largest school system which is in New York City has 60 percent of the state’s black public school students attend school in the five boroughs, along with two-thirds of the state’s Asian and Latino students but only 10 percent of New York state’s white students. So, how did all this segregation came about? The changing demographics in the state paired with a lack of diversity-focused policies which include subpar transportation systems for students and restrictive admissions standards is one of the factor that caused the increasing segregation of public school students. Integration problems also started with parents choosing where to live. They are most definitely influenced by the perception that whites wont treat them equally, whether that perception is real or not, and whether its rooted in formal education or pop culture. Basically this residential segregation is defined as â€Å"the physical separation of cultural groups based on residence and housing,† which sorts different populations into their own sectors. The main â€Å"issue† of residential segregation is the wealthier white community not allowing blacks to move into their neighborhoods, which is  true in some atypical cases. However, it doesn’t make sense why anyone would want to live in a neighborhood where they feel threatened or unwelcome, pertaining to the minuscule amount of neighborhoods that still practice racism. Some real estate companies are assumed to sell certain properties to individuals based on race. Yet, this point is not valid. Buyers give real estate agents a budget for what they can afford and this is the factor that limits them to specific neighborhoods. Statistically, minorities’ average income is less than that of a white person. Most of  minorities such as Asian are still struggling to get a high paid job compared to the white people . Therefore, they can only afford certain size houses in particular neighborhoods. For example, in New York City, the Chinese people tend to live in Flushing and Chinatown where houses and the cost of living are relatively cheaper than other parts of the cities. In reality, people living where they can afford causes this so called residential segregation which then leads to our problem of discussion, the education segregation. I would like to research deeper on how racial inequality in America causes  education segregation in our society today and also why are people still stuck to this norm. I had read many interesting articles regarding education segregation which can further improve my knowledge on how economical imbalance can be connected to education segregation as well as residential segregation around the states. I will also get a better understanding on how education segregation causes inequality to the people and why is this issue still going on after so much efforts had been taken via the article â€Å"Still Separate, Still Unequal† by Jonathan Kozol. This racial segregation in education has to be solved efficiently really soon before it gets even worst. The United States of America is blessed with people from all over the world and is one of the richest country in terms of diversity and cultures. We should be grateful that America is able to bring together people of different races and therefore should try the best to promote equality among everyone and also prevent stereotyping. It is important that the government try to think of a more effective way for city planning, housing development, and even school district demographics to ensure that America’s education.