http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzfg0RGJnV8

Conclusion

Busing was one of the things the Board and Patterson came up with. This met with a lot of opposition from the white communities (parents and students). Parents were really opposed to busing elementary school students to other neighborhoods. So the proposal was for the elementary level students to stay in their neighborhoods and set up magnets for secondary school. Students complained about this but most of them used buses to get to schools. So this is the proposal the board came up with: (1) they reduce the number of elementary schools they were to pair up, (2) limited the number of junior high students that would be moving from one school to another, and (3) the information was vague about secondary schools. Patterson lasted only until he had a showdown with Schaefer in the fall of 1974.

Now you will have to agree the Baltimore City Schools never really desegregated their school system. When Patterson took over his office things should have already been in place for a desegregation plan. It seems that city officials and the school board failed to do the jobs they were hired for. Instead they tried to maintain the white tax dollars that where left in the city. If improvements had of been made to the school system prior to the Brown case maybe so many whites would not have moved to the county. The state never really took a stand before the Civil War, yet after it was over and more freed slaves arrived in Baltimore it became a problem. They didn’t want to live with them or correct the errors they made with allocations for a school system that was already failing them. At least this was one of the reasons why they moved to the county.

Brown v. Board of Education caused Baltimore City Public Schools to open on a desegregated basis. Some Desegregation was already in effect at Baltimore Poly Institute being forced to admit African-American students on its prestigious "A" course in 1952. In September 1954, the School adopted the "Free Choice" method provided that no child shall be required to attend any particular school." Under the freedom-of-choice plan approved by the school board, the number of black students attending formerly white schools in September was not large. The Superintendent of schools interprets the free choice transfer policy as the unlimited right of students to transfer, except into district schools and some special programs. Parents were discouraged from transferring their students from predominantly Negro school. Some White parents were also discourages from sending their children to school with substantial Negro enrollments.

Strike

In 1974 there was a teacher’s strike and faced a major confrontation over desegregation in the schools. Roland Patterson was the first black superintendent of the schools (served from 1971 – 1974). Teachers went on strike Monday, February 4, 1974. Only 29 percent of the students had attended classes. By the third day only 16 percent of the students showed up and less than a quarter of the staff. The system had been shut down. For the 1973-74 school years the teachers had been working without a contract. Their salaries were low, their working conditions were poor, and the classrooms were overcrowded. Patterson kept the schools open in spite of the energy crisis. If the schools closed they might not get money from the state and federal governments. Mayor Schaefer felt that an increase in funds to the school at that time would make the takes higher and he would risk the chances of more white flight from the city. The teachers reached an agreement for a 6 percent wage increase. They return to work on March 4.

Former Mayor Schaefer

Racial tension was further exposed by a federal mandate which meant Baltimore had to produce a desegregation plan. After the Brown decision the courts did little in the way of punishing those that had not adhered to the ruling. Things changed in the 1970’s, and punishment stemmed from the federal rulings of the1960’s. “Since Baltimore’s schools received substantial federal funds as a result of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, they came under the domain of Title VI of the Civil rights Act of 1964, which prohibited discrimination in entities that received federal funds.” This could mean a withdrawal of funds in an already pinched economy. If Baltimore didn’t please the federal government this could mean a 10 percent budget cut or even more if the state wasn’t happy.

With all this tension going on Peter Holmes, a lawyer who headed Hew’s Office of Civil Rights sent a letter to Patterson in 1973. He informed him of the intentions of the Supreme Court’s decision in Adams v. Richardson. This required Hew (Department of Health Education and Welfare) to communicate with Baltimore and other districts. This correspondence was to put them on notice to rebut or explain the racial disproportion in the schools. Patterson was ordered to come up with data on racial balance in each school. Holmes reminded him of Swann v. Charlotte Mecklenberg, which warranted “ a presumption against schools that are substantially disproportionate in their racial composition." Patterson tried to stall and used the same old arguments (the demography). In 1974, the Federal government reached a decision and gave Patterson 30 days to come up with a desegregation plan.

Some Schools

Class picture of Students from Paul Laurence Dunbar high School before desegregation

Prior to desegregation Douglass and Baltimore's Paul Laurence Dunbar High School were the only two high schools in Baltimore that admitted African American students. Douglass served African American students from west Baltimore, while Dunbar served students from east Baltimore.

African Americans joined City College for the first time in September 1954. It was only 10 African American students that attended City College in 1954. A significant proportion of the student populatio was African American by the 1960s. The school saw further changes in the student population with the admission of women in 1978.

In 1952, Poly became the first high school in the Baltimore City school system to racially integrate its student body.

Changes

It wasn’t until 1963 that the school board tried to make a change by eliminating districts completely. This was the end also of the criticism of the Baltimore City School System. The quality of the schools dropped as the schools became more African-American. It was clear that white parents that remained in the city were sending their children to private institutions. The biracial parent’s group had suggested a list of steps the board could have taken to upgrade schools. If the quality of schools ha improved this would have counteracted white flight. According to Marian Edelman (head of the Children’s Defense Fund) school officials clung to the myth of free choice. Schools officials could not by law (Milliken v. Bradley) get help from the surrounding counties. They had no legal basis for demanding or requiring it. Investment in the schools and political clout left with the wealthy and middle-class parents. So the school system abandoned any attempt to achieve racial balance and concentrated instead on making the schools as equal as possible. This meant of course improvements in the schools and new schools.

· “Public policies also affected the school. By this time the city had lost 13 percent of its population to the suburbs.” By 1974, 70 percent of the public school students in Baltimore were black; by 1980 the figure was close to 80 percent.” Passage of a comprehensive civil rights law in 1964, affected the school system as well. It prohibited discrimination in activities supported by the Federal Government even though it had been aimed at racial discrimination in hiring and firing. The next year Congress passed an aid to education law that supplied local schools districts with federal support. This was a means to supplement teacher’s salaries and build new schools. These laws had nothing to do with Baltimore but it was an advantage for the city. Federal funds became an important part of the school budget but allocation for this money was based on number of poor students in a district. “Forty-two percent of those funds, came from Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Act of 1965, the largest category was the federal school lunch program.” This is where the city got things twisted. They disagreed with the federal government on how the money should be spent. The bulk of the money was to improve the conditions for African-American students. Instead it became a part of the regular school budget.Federal funds weren’t the only problem faced by the school system. The local property tax decreased because the population declined, so local revenues ceased to be the major source of funding. As the city became dependent on Federal funds, it became dependent on state funding as well between 1970 and 1975. So the city was responsible to the state and the federal governments.

Superintendent

After Brown, the leaders and educators wanted to comply with the courts, yet this would upset the existing school structure. This was the idea for the next forty years. Fisher the superintendent implemented a plan that would eliminate race from being a consideration for admission. Students were allowed to attend any school in the city. But transfers had to be approved by the two principals involved. This wasn’t necessary if the student had moved. District lines only came into play if the school

By 1960, the schools had more African-American children in segregated schools then before Brown v. Board of Education. And the schools continued to be overcrowded. A biracial parents group began to track the progress of desegregation in 1962. The findings were presented in March 1963. Single-race schools had increased by 13,000. African-American children attending elementary schools was 88 percent which had meant a decrease of only 9 percent since 1955. The high school figures told the same story student enrollment had increased by 4,500. The school board was clearly not trying to achieve racial balance in enrollment or faculty. There were 53 all white faculties and 67 all black faculties out of 189 schools.

This report focused on overcrowding of schools as well. Black schools were overcrowded. This was to be avoided by “districting” a school, which was not effective. In 1960, Geprge Brain became Superintendent for Baltimore City Public Schools In 1962, thirty-three schools resorted to part-time classes. These students attended school for four hours a day which meant the loss of thirty-six class days. Parents also suffered, they had to stay home and supervise children that should have been in school. This only affected 4 percent of white students as opposed to 79 percent black students. Obtaining a transfer was made difficult by the rules that they had to be adhered to. In reality free choice was limited by strict transfer rules and school districting. Superintendent George Brain attributed the problems to segregated schools and the departure of whites from Baltimore’s inner city.

The real problem was the board’s insistence on retaining the neighborhood school concept. Brain pointed out that the children were not forced to go to neighborhood schools. Baltimore at this time was a city of segregated neighborhoods. Schools had been built in these neighborhoods that would ensure any desegregation plan would fail. Principals refused transfer requests to keep children in their neighborhoods. “ The departure of whites from Baltimore following Brown added to the problem. In 1960, enrollment in Baltimore’s schools became majority black for the first time.”

Introduction

I change my topic from Walbrook Junction to The Desegregation of Baltimore City Public Schools. Maryland as a southern state did not actually practice segregation as its southern counterparts but it did nothing to prevent the way that the educational system was set up either. There were three major issues that emerged that seem to have a strong impact on the situation that Baltimore found itself in. First, were the racial dividing lines that had been in place since the 1930’s and 1940’s. Second, was the sudden movement into rural Maryland. Later the impact that was felt from Brown v. Board of Education did little to change the situation. Finally the school system felt an impact from the crisis that occurred in the 70’s, which left an already troubled school system open for ridicule. I will begin by describing the area in which Baltimore was growing and the direction its population was being drawn to. Next, I will describe the impact that was felt because of the case cited above as well as those cases that were combined into this one. Then I will talk about the problems that occurred within the school system itself. After evaluating the evidence I will present one will come to the conclusion that Baltimore City never really complied with the changes lawmakers had hoped to accomplish with Brown v. Board of Education.

Let’s begin with the location of the city at that time. Baltimore was a Mason-Dixon metropolis; it was right on the border line. This meant there was a one hour drive from the heart of the north or the south. Baltimore always had a large population of free African-Americans. “Baltimore still suffered from de facto segregation. Movement away from the city were brought about by several different reasons. Industrialization, congestion, and social groups viewed as undesirable made relocation to the city limits and beyond more attractive. In the beginning blacks and whites lived closed to each other in what was known as a “walking city”. After the Civil War Baltimore’s black population experienced a growth spurt. More blacks were moving out of the south to seek opportunities in the north. A lot of them made Baltimore their home. The white population began looking at the rural areas surrounding Baltimore as an option for the rising taxes and better schools. With the invention of better transportation and the expansion a pattern of segregation began that was preserved by law and custom. The black population inhabited northwest and northeast Baltimore in the downtown area. Fulton Avenue was the Westside racial dividing line in the 1930’s and 1940’s. “Old West Baltimore was bounded by North Avenue on the north, Franklin Street on the south, and Madison and Fulton Streets on the east and west.” Before WWI the Baltimore City Council passed ordinances three times to forbidding blacks from moving into white neighborhoods.

“On the 3800 block of Juniper Road, no one cares about the fate of Baltimore city schools for the simple reason that not one of the families sends its children to them”. The children from this neighborhood attended expensive private schools. So these parents voices can’t be hear arguing for increased school funding. The people are looking to surrounding Baltimore County to find relief from high taxes and better schools. School officials were echoing the slave masters fear of and resistance to educating blacks “The original funding formula stipulated that school taxes paid by the whites would go to white schools, while taxes paid by blacks would go to black schools, in this way black schools would remain inferior.“In 1920, the Maryland public schools spent $36.03 per year for each white child but only spent $13.20 for each black child.

The Junction

I grew up in Walbrook Junction and I realize that I don't know alot about the Junction. Thats why I decided to do my Paper on Walbrook Junction. Walbrook's history reaches back to 1669.

The picture is a of Walbrook Theatre which is know a church. Wow I think this is going to be interesting already learned something that I don't know. Even look at this picture I can't really tell where this is.