CONTACT:  Will Potter  (202) 822-7823 

October 10, 2006 

NEA  Urges Supreme Court to Uphold Desegregation Plans Tailored by Local School Districts

Major  labor and civil rights organizations join NEA to support diversity in education 

WASHINGTON—Prohibiting school districts from using tailored policies to ensure equitable, diverse enrollment would be a major step back from protecting the right of every child to a quality public education. The National Education Association and leading labor and civil rights organizations filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court today, supporting policies used by two school districts to desegregate local schools.

“Separation in education can never be equal,” said Reg Weaver, NEA president. “These districts are pushing forward, and striving for more equitable and diverse schools. Striking down these policies could roll back hard-fought gains that have been made in making quality public education more accessible to everyone.”

A host of other organizations, including the AFL-CIO, People for the American Way, American Federation of Teachers, and 43 NEA state affiliates also signed on to the brief in support of the schools.

The cases involve constitutional challenges to voluntary, race-conscious student assignment plans adopted by the Seattle School District and the Jefferson County Board of Education in Kentucky. They are scheduled to be argued in tandem on December 4, in what will be the most significant Supreme Court decision on the role of race in education in years.

The Seattle policy allowed students to attend the school of their choice, and used race as one of several tiebreakers for popular schools if it would help bring the school closer to the district’s average racial composition. A similar program at issue in the Kentucky case aimed to keep the Black student population between 15 and 50 percent of the total population at most schools. About 35 percent of the 97,000 students in the district are Black. In 2004, the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University called Kentucky schools among the most integrated in the nation.

NEA urged the court to uphold the value of diversity in education, which a substantial body of research has shown actually improves the quality of education for all students. “Interactions among students of different races—with different vantage points, skills, and values—are of great consequence not only to the students’ development as citizens in a multiracial, democratic society, but also to their intellectual development,” the brief says. “The impact of encountering and dealing with racial diversity as part of their education is positively linked to growth in cognitive and academic skills of both racial minority and white students. These educational benefits are realized not only while children are in school, but in their subsequent lives as well.”

NEA had also filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court in Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger, two cases involving challenges to the University of Michigan’s student admission plans that were decided in 2003.

“Upholding these policies won’t be enough, on its own, to close the gaps in student achievement,” Weaver said. “That will take adequate and equitable funding, qualified teachers, small classrooms and up-to-date materials. And it will take cooperation from parents, educators and lawmakers. These policies aren’t a cure-all for disparities in education, but they’re a key part of a larger solution."

www.nea.org/presscenter/images/seattleschools.pdf (PDF, 209KB, 45 pages)

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The National Education Association is the nation's largest professional employee organization, representing 3.2 million elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty, education support professionals, school administrators, retired educators and students preparing to become teachers.