Still Failing: The Continuing Paradox of School Desegregation

(Hardback, Second Edition)

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Still Failing: The Continuing Paradox of School Desegregation is a significantly updated and revised version of Caldas and Bankstons previous book Forced to Fail: The Paradox of School Desegregation. The book includes an analysis of the most significant Supreme Court cases that have been decided in the ten years since the first edition of the book appeared. The authors consider the important implications of these recent rulings for the future of school desegregation in Americas schools. Social capital theory is used to explain why schools and communities continue to be segregated along racial and ethnic lines. Still Failing also provides the most recent U.S. census and Department of Education statistics documenting the continuing segregation of American schools and districts. The book also continues to track the persistent racial achievement gap, using the newest ACT, SAT, and NAEP testing figures. Finally, the book considers what present segregation trends portend for future efforts to racially and ethnically integrate schools, and close achievement gaps. Additional key features of this book include: Historical antecedents showing how and why American schooling became racially segregated Social capital theory to explain school and community segregation The legal history of all important supreme court cases, congressional laws and presidential executive orders related to school segregation and desegregation Easy-to-read and interpret graphs and figures The most up-to-date school population and census information

Reviews

Still Failing reveals Americas daunting reality of the persistent racial gap in academic achievement despite decades of judicial actions on school desegregation. Critical of top-down social engineering, the authors offer an alternative account to explain why desegregation still fails to meet its intended goal, guiding readers toward a better understanding of how race, class, and social networks influence educational outcomes and help them envision a more realistic approach to equal access to educational opportunities. -- Min Zhou, Tan Lark Sye Chair Professor of Sociology at Nanyang Technological University and co-author of The Asian American Achievement Paradox
There are things we think we know that we in fact need to be reminded of now and then. Caldas and Bankston teach us that the way we approached Americas race problems in the 1950s and 1960s doesnt apply gracefully to the 2010s, even when it comes to noble-sounding concepts such as desegregation of schools. Still Failing: The Continuing Paradox of School Desegregation points us to how we can get kids of all colors educated in an America long past the stark oppositions of the era of Brown v. the Board of Education. -- John McWhorter, associate professor, Center for American Studies, Columbia University
Caldas and Bankston have done an excellent job in dissecting the ongoing dilemma of school desegregation. They bring solid credentials to the job, having worked on numerous school desegregation cases and authored numerous research studies.They argue, convincingly, that the issue of race is more about economic and family inequality than racial differences, and that coercive policies to bring about racial or socioeconomic balance in schools have been counter-productive. They ask that we let schools be schools instead of laboratories for social experiments, and they endorse policies that stress individual family choices for the of type of school program that best serves their children. -- David Armor, Professor Emeritus, School of Policy, Government, and International Affairs, George Mason University

Author Bio

Stephen J. Caldas has published many articles and books on school desegregation. He also publishes in the area of bilingual education. He currentlyteaches quantitative research methodology and education policy at Manhattanville College in New York. Carl L. Bankston III is an American sociologist and author. He is best known for his work on immigration to the United States, particularly on the adaptation of Vietnamese-American immigrants, and for his work on ethnicity, social capital, sociology of religion, and the sociology of eduction.