Segregation In Connecticut Public Schools

After decades of federal and state legislation and judicial activism, hundreds of millions of dollars invested in schools and programs designed to address racial, ethnic and economic isolation, and the focus of countless educators, policymakers, and stakeholders, segregation of public schools remains a pernicious reality. The elephant in the room of our national discourse about race continues to be the de facto segregation of our communities, and by extension of community-based segregation, the segregation of our nation’s system of public schools. Sixty-two years after the United States Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education (1954) decision ended de jure segregation of public schools, many communities in the United States continue to

Educational advocates in Connecticut who desired to end the segregation of Connecticut Public Schools warmly welcomed the Sheff decision. The Connecticut State Supreme Court also declared that there was a strong causal relationship between racial, ethnic, and economic isolation, and lower academic achievement of Minority students (Eckes, 2005). Educational advocates seeking to narrow Connecticut’s achievement gap, and ensure high standards for all Connecticut students viewed this declaration as a victory. In 1999, there was an atmosphere of hope; it seemed that finally, the segregation of Connecticut public schools would end, and the massive achievement gap between White and Minority students, and wealthy and poor public school districts would narrow. By extension, the hope was that Connecticut could become a blueprint for efforts to end segregation in states across the

Connecticut General Statute 10-189 establishes that “A local or regional board of education is mandated to provide free school services to all school age children who are permanent residents of the town or school district.” This statute empowers school districts to deny educational services to students who reside outside of the local school district. The Court recognized that district residency requirements established by state law in Connecticut are the root cause of segregation and a primary contributing factor to the lower academic achievement of racially, ethnically and economically isolated Minority students (Eckes, 2005). It was clear to the Court, and blatantly obvious to any objective observer of public education in Connecticut, that the State’s system in which 169 independent towns and cities manage educational services at the local level is the primary cause of racial, ethnic, and economic