Desegregation stalls, but voluntary efforts to boost it show promise

Nationally, school segregation has been on the rise. With less pressure from courts and the federal government in recent decades, it’s increasingly up to local communities to get creative if they see integrated schools as key to promoting equity, improving academic outcomes, fostering a less divided society, or all of the above.

After the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education and the subsequent wave of desegregation orders, black and white student integration increased – until it peaked in 1988. Hundreds of school districts still have open desegregation orders, either through the courts or federal civil rights agreements, but many are no longer actively monitored, researchers say.

“We’ve lost much of that progress,” says Halley Potter, a senior fellow at The Century Foundation in New York, which advocates for reducing inequality. Add to the mix

Many reasons for resurgenceMore attention for economic factorsNew study identifies integration effortsCharter school impact