Inequality and Segregation in America's Schools

By: Haley Witschey, Psychology, '20

For my second self-directed learning project, I read the book Savage Inequalities: Children in America’s Schools by Jonathan Kozol. This book was written in 1991, but it illustrates just how segregated American public schools are, due to numerous economic and social factors. Kozol illustrates the hard divide between the rich and the poor within education, and how that divide is even more intensified by racial issues.

The author visits some of the poorest areas in American cities and compares them to some of the wealthiest schools in the same city. Kozol visits East St. Louis, IL, Chicago, IL, New York City, Camden, NJ, and Washington D.C. throughout the book to examine the education systems. From his findings, he discovers that schools are underfunded, understaffed, and underequipped.

There were many heart-breaking, eye-opening passages throughout the book that illustrated to the reader just how evident the racial and economic divides are in public schools. In one passage on page 45, Kozol is visiting a kindergarten classroom in North Lawndale, Chicago, and he explains the depressing and true probable futures of children growing up in the area. He states, “Twelve years from now, if these neighborhood statistics hold true for these children, 14 of these 23 boys and girls will have dropped out of school. Fourteen years from now, four of these kids, at most, will go to college. Eighteen years from now, one of those four may graduate from college, but three of the 12 boys in this kindergarten will already have spent time in prison.” He goes on to explain just how saddening it is to see these hopeful, friendly faces, and to know what the future most likely holds for all of them. It is not the children’s fault that they were born into an unfair, racially prejudiced society, and the outcomes of growing up in this area surrounded by poverty and hardship are bound to negatively affect these smiling, hopeful faces, and that is extremely disheartening and problematic.

In another chapter, Kozol visits Camden, New Jersey, where he is exposed to just how underfunded and overfilled some of the schools are in the lower-income school district of Patterson. On page 160, Kozol states, “The city is so short of space that four elementary schools now occupy abandoned factories. Children at one wood-framed elementary school … eat lunch in a section of the boiler room. A bathroom houses reading classes.” He also explains that in a school with 2,200 students there is only one physics section, while in the wealthier nearby school district of Summit, there’s six physics sections for 1,100 students. These examples illustrate that due to the underfunded and overcrowded nature of these public schools, children have hardly any chance to get the resources and experiences needed to succeed after they are done in school. Even more so than this, a majority of these students in the poorer schools are not white, again showing how segregation still exists and how it prevents students from succeeding and escaping the mold of poverty.

On page 27, Kozol discusses another severely segregated and underfunded school system within our country, located in East St. Louis, IL. When visiting a high school, he encounters an Introductory Home Ec. classroom and speaks with the teacher. “I ask her whether she regards this class as preparation for employment. ‘Not this class,’ she says. ‘The ones who move on to advanced Home Ec. are given job instruction.’ When I ask her what jobs they are trained for, she says: ‘Fast food places--Burger King, McDonald’s.’” This conversation reveals the sort-of cycles of poverty that exist in communities like this. The students within these schools are not looked at as much more than just becoming fast food workers, never destined to attend college or told to dream bigger than just their small, poor community.

As part of my project, I just wanted to expose my class to the racial and economic injustices that students within these public school systems must go through. To compare to present day, I examined some of the cities and schools discussed within the book to see if any changes have occurred since Kozol wrote the book. I unfortunately found that truly nothing has changed for the better. Instead, schools are still extremely segregated. For example, when looking at the demographic information between Hope College Prep High School, located in North Lawndale, versus New Trier Township High School, a much wealthier area public high school, the statistics are staggering.

Screenshotted from illinoisstatereportcard.com

Screenshotted from illinoisstatereportcard.com

What is even worse is examining the percentage of students viewed as coming from low income families from both of these schools. When these statistics are put together, it is evident that segregation still exists, and it is intensified by economic factors. In Hope College Prep High School, 97.9% were low income, while at New Trier Township High School, only 3.7% of students qualified as low income. Both of these schools are public Chicago schools, but due to social and economic factors, they are extremely segregated and discriminatory. According to Illinois State Report Card ‘17-’18 school year data, Hope College Prep had a 75% graduation rate, compared to New Trier’s 98%. Teachers at Hope College Prep were making, on average, $73,661, while New Trier’s average annual salary was over $114,000. One of the most staggering statistics, in my opinion, from last year’s data was that at Hope College Prep, 0% of juniors scored proficient on the SAT, while 80% of New Trier juniors had proficient SAT scores.

These data and graphs reveal that not much has changed since this book was written in 1991. Schools are still underfunded and overcrowded, and although segregation might've been outlawed over 60 years ago, it still exists. In order to stop this cycle of poverty, there is a lot of work to do. Jonathan Kozol, author of Savage Inequalities: Children in America's Schools, expands on these ideas in this video. We must value teachers more, give better and equal funding to all public schools, and above all, realize that education is the #1 way for individuals to escape poverty and to change this constant cycle. We have to start setting up all children equally for success, no matter their race or economic background.