Court-Ordered School Desegregation Begins in Chicago
Monday, February 7, 2005 at 05:46AM
TheSpook
Minority Students Transfer To 34 City Schools
Chicago minority students began transferring into 34 of the city's
substantially white public schools this week in response to a federal
judge's court order. U.S. District Judge Charles Kocoras ruled in
December that the Chicago Board of Education had to find seats in
substantially white schools for black and Latino students. His order
was in response to U.S. Justice Department claims that the school
district violated the latest version of its desegregation agreement by
not offering any racial transfers this year to improve integration.
Although Chicago Public Schools administrators had said the schools
were overcrowded, they found 308 open slots after the court order. More
than 280 minority students accepted the open spots at the substantially
white schools. That number decreased to about 190 as some parents
determined travel arrangements were too difficult for their children.
The school district has given parents until the Friday deadline to
transfer their children to new schools, said Sherri Thornton, Chicago
Public Schools' associate general counsel. Chicago is the nation's
third-largest school district with 431,000 students. For the past 24
years, the public school system has had a voluntary agreement with the
federal government to integrate its schools. Kocoras in 2003 called the
1980 agreement "outdated." When the original agreement was struck, the
district was 19 percent white, but that number has since dwindled to
9.2 percent. The district has never admitted it segregated its students
but agreed to let the Justice Department monitor its schools. [more]
Full federal appeals court to hear Lynn desegregation plan [more]