Making School Desegregation Work

Abstract

The first section of this chapter contains a set of principles about school desegregation. In preparing them, I (Miller, 1977) specifically attempted to construct a set of guidelines that would appeal broadly to social scientists and at the same time reflect current evidence and research related to school desegregation. Over 25 outstanding social scientists, including several past presidents of the American Psychological Association and the American Sociological Association, endorsed them. All had established their reputation for work in desegregation and/or closely related areas such as prejudice, interpersonal relations, and social mobility. Subsequently, these principles were submitted by the Los Angeles City Board of Education to the court of Judge Paul Eagly as part of their second desegregation plan. I prepared them after the court had rejected the first plan submitted by the Los Angeles Board of Education, hoping they would not only educate the court, but also influence the school board and the district in their preparation of a new plan. In later sections of the chapter I discuss in detail recent data that bear on a notion which is the cornerstone for much theorizing about how school desegregation produces academic benefit for minority children, namely, the lateral transmission of values hypothesis. Finally, I discuss briefly some alternate classroom and educational strategies for desegregation.