This article consists almost entirely of a plot summary .(August 2024) |
Author | Jonathan Kozol |
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Language | English and Spanish |
Subject | Education |
Genre | Sociological |
Publisher | Harper Perennial |
Publication date | 1991 |
Publication place | United States of America |
Pages | 255 |
ISBN | 0-06-097499-0 |
OCLC | 25631711 |
371.96/7 20 | |
LC Class | LC409 .K69 1992 |
Savage Inequalities: Children in America's Schools is a book written by Jonathan Kozol in 1991 that discusses the disparities in education between schools of different classes and races. [1] It is based on his observations of various classrooms in the public school systems of East St. Louis, Chicago, New York City, Camden, Cincinnati, and Washington D.C. His observations take place in both schools with the lowest per capita spending on students and the highest, ranging from just over $3,000 in Camden, New Jersey to a maximum expenditure of up to $15,000 in Great Neck, Long Island. [2] [3] [4]
In his visits to these areas, Kozol illustrates the overcrowded, unsanitary and often understaffed environment that is lacking in basic tools and textbooks for teaching. He cites the large proportions of minorities in the areas with the lowest annual budgets, despite the higher taxation rate on individuals living in poverty within the school district. [5]
Kozol cites various historical cases regarding lawsuits filed against school districts in East Orange, Camden, Irvington and Jersey City in which judges have sided with the children and concerned locals in a given district instead of adhering to state law concerning the taxation and distribution of funding. He additionally goes into detail comparing the current conditions poor, minority children are expected to learn in, and the findings of the historical case Brown v. Board of Education , and Plessy v. Ferguson .
He also mentions other such historical cases in which the outcomes have supported what he views to be an unjust system of funds distribution and taxation in Milliken v. Bradley , San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez , and through the overturning of State Supreme Court decisions in both Michigan and Texas by the Supreme Court of the United States.
Kozol argues that racial segregation is still alive and well in the American educational system, due to the gross inequalities that result from unequal distribution of funds collected through both property taxes and funds distributed by the State in an attempt to "equalize" the expenditures of schools.
Desegregation is the process of ending the separation of two groups, usually referring to races. Desegregation is typically measured by the index of dissimilarity, allowing researchers to determine whether desegregation efforts are having impact on the settlement patterns of various groups. This is most commonly used in reference to the United States. Desegregation was long a focus of the American civil rights movement, both before and after the US Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education, particularly desegregation of the school systems and the military. Racial integration of society was a closely related goal.
Public finance refers to the monetary resources available to governments and also to the study of finance within government and role of the government in the economy. As a subject of study, it is the branch of economics which assesses the government revenue and government expenditure of the public authorities and the adjustment of one or the other to achieve desirable effects and avoid undesirable ones. The purview of public finance is considered to be threefold, consisting of governmental effects on:
A progressive tax is a tax in which the tax rate increases as the taxable amount increases. The term progressive refers to the way the tax rate progresses from low to high, with the result that a taxpayer's average tax rate is less than the person's marginal tax rate. The term can be applied to individual taxes or to a tax system as a whole. Progressive taxes are imposed in an attempt to reduce the tax incidence of people with a lower ability to pay, as such taxes shift the incidence increasingly to those with a higher ability-to-pay. The opposite of a progressive tax is a regressive tax, such as a sales tax, where the poor pay a larger proportion of their income compared to the rich.
Economic inequality is an umbrella term for a) income inequality or distribution of income, b) wealth inequality or distribution of wealth, and c) consumption inequality. Each of these can be measured between two or more nations, within a single nation, or between and within sub-populations.
Robert Ernest Andrews is an American politician who served as a U.S. representative for New Jersey's 1st congressional district from 1990 to 2014. The district included most of Camden County and parts of Burlington County and Gloucester County. He is a member of the Democratic Party.
Tape v. Hurley, 66 Cal. 473, (1885) was a landmark court case in the California Supreme Court in which the Court found the exclusion of a Chinese American student from public school based on her ancestry unlawful. The case effectively ruled that minority children were entitled to attend public school in California. After the Court's decision, San Francisco Superintendent of Schools, Andrew J. Moulder, urged the California state assembly to pass new state legislation which enabled the establishment of segregated schools under the separate but equal doctrine, like the later Plessy v. Ferguson (1896). The establishment of the new school marked the continued segregation in the education system in California.
Jonathan Kozol is an American writer, progressive activist, and educator, best known for his books on public education in the United States.
Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1 (1947), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court that applied the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to state law. Before this decision, the clause, which states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion", restricted only the federal government, while many states continued to grant certain religious denominations legislative or effective privileges.
Florence Moltrop Kelley was an American social and political reformer who coined the term wage abolitionism. Her work against sweatshops and for the minimum wage, eight-hour workdays, and children's rights is widely regarded today.
Abbott districts are school districts in New Jersey that are provided remedies to ensure that their students receive public education in accordance with the state constitution. They were created in 1985 as a result of the first ruling of Abbott v. Burke, a case filed by the Education Law Center. The ruling asserted that public primary and secondary education in poor communities throughout the state was unconstitutionally substandard. The Abbott II ruling in 1990 had the most far-reaching effects, ordering the state to fund the (then) 28 Abbott districts at the average level of the state's wealthiest districts. The Abbott District system was replaced in 2007 by the New Jersey Schools Development Authority.
Facilities and services such as housing, healthcare, education, employment, and transportation have been systematically separated in the United States based on racial categorizations. Segregation was the legally or socially enforced separation of African Americans from whites, as well as the separation of other ethnic minorities from majority and mainstream communities. While mainly referring to the physical separation and provision of separate facilities, it can also refer to other manifestations such as prohibitions against interracial marriage, and the separation of roles within an institution. The U.S. Armed Forces were formally segregated until 1948, as black units were separated from white units but were still typically led by white officers.
Income inequality has fluctuated considerably in the United States since measurements began around 1915, moving in an arc between peaks in the 1920s and 2000s, with a 30-year period of relatively lower inequality between 1950 and 1980.
The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America is a 2005 book by educator and author Jonathan Kozol. It describes how, in the United States, black and Hispanic students tend to be concentrated in schools where they make up almost the entire student body.
Educational Inequality is the unequal distribution of academic resources, including but not limited to school funding, qualified and experienced teachers, books, physical facilities and technologies, to socially excluded communities. These communities tend to be historically disadvantaged and oppressed. Individuals belonging to these marginalized groups are often denied access to schools with adequate resources and those that can be accessed are so distant from these communities. Inequality leads to major differences in the educational success or efficiency of these individuals and ultimately suppresses social and economic mobility. Inequality in education is broken down into different types: regional inequality, inequality by sex, inequality by social stratification, inequality by parental income, inequality by parent occupation, and many more.
Effort optimism is the confidence that acquiring the skills valued by the majority of society, such as those skills measured by IQ tests, ACT, and SATs, are worthwhile. This outlook is grounded on different cultural belief systems that link effort with success.
Racial diversity in United States schools is the representation of different racial or ethnic groups in American schools. The institutional practice of slavery, and later segregation, in the United States prevented certain racial groups from entering the school system until midway through the 20th century, when Brown v. Board of Education forbade racially segregated education. Globalization and migrations of peoples to the United States have increasingly led to a multicultural American population, which has in turn increased classroom diversity. Nevertheless, racial separation in schools still exists today, presenting challenges for racial diversification of public education in the United States.
School segregation in the United States was the segregation of students in educational facilities based on their race and ethnicity. While not prohibited from having or attending schools, various minorities were barred from most schools that admitted white students. Segregation was enforced legally in the U.S. states, primarily in the Southern United States, although segregation could occur in informal settings or through social expectations and norms. Segregation laws were met with resistance by Civil Rights activists and began to be challenged in 1954 by cases brought before the U.S. Supreme Court. Segregation continued longstanding exclusionary policies in much of the Southern United States after the Civil War. Jim Crow laws codified segregation. These laws were influenced by the history of slavery and discrimination in the US. Secondary schools for African Americans in the South were called training schools instead of high schools in order to appease racist whites and focused on vocational education. School integration in the United States took place at different times in different areas and often met resistance. After the ruling of Brown v. Board of Education, which banned segregated school laws, school segregation took de facto form. School segregation declined rapidly during the late 1960s and early 1970s as the government became strict on schools' plans to combat segregation more effectively as a result of Green v. County School Board of New Kent County. Voluntary segregation by income appears to have increased since 1990. Racial segregation has either increased or stayed constant since 1990, depending on which definition of segregation is used. In general, definitions based on the amount of interaction between black and white students show increased racial segregation, while definitions based on the proportion of black and white students in different schools show racial segregation remaining approximately constant.
The free school movement, also known as the new schools or alternative schools movement, was an American education reform movement during the 1960s and early 1970s that sought to change the aims of formal schooling through alternative, independent community schools.
Public Education in the United States of America provide basic education from kindergarten until the twelfth grade. This is provided free of charge for the students and parents, but is paid for by taxes on property owners as well as general taxes collected by the federal government. This education is mandated by the states. With the completion of this basic schooling, one obtains a high school diploma as certification of basic skills for employers.
Unequal access to education in the United States results in unequal outcomes for students. Disparities in academic access among students in the United States are the result of multiple factors including government policies, school choice, family wealth, parenting style, implicit bias towards students' race or ethnicity, and the resources available to students and their schools. Educational inequality contributes to a number of broader problems in the United States, including income inequality and increasing prison populations. Educational inequalities in the United States are wide-ranging, and many potential solutions have been proposed to mitigate their impacts on students.