Movement Toward Inclusive Education

A new law in Texas was passed in 2021 that limits the way teachers can discuss racism in Texas classrooms.

Read the full text of House Bill 3979

Read Texas teachers’ points of view on HB 3979 on edweek.org

The Indian Self Determination and Education Assistance Act authorized government agencies to make grants directly to federally recognized Native American tribes. This rejuvenated tribal governments and allowed tribes to operate their own schools.

American Indian Relief Council website

Mary Jane Patterson is the first African-American woman to earn a B.A. degree at an American university. She graduated from Oberlin College in 1862 and went on to become an educator herself.

Read more about Mary Jane on BlackPast.org

From its founding, Oberlin college accepted Black students and women and has a long history of dedication to African-American education. Oberlin has a long history of commitment to the fight for social justice, and was a stop on the underground railroad.

Read more about Oberlin College on Blackpast.org

Boston Latin is the first public school in the United States. When it opened, the school only accepted white boys.

In 2022, Florida passed the ‘Parental Rights in Education Law’ which limits teachers in grades K – 3 classrooms from discussing LGBTQ+ issues in school. Several other states have passed or proposed similar “don’t say gay” laws of their own.

NPR article on various “don’t say gay” bills around the US

Read more about Florida’s “don’t say gay” bill

LGBTQ+ curricular laws in the US

The Department of Education issues official guidance to clarify that transgender students are protected from discrimination under Title IX, a federal civil rights law that prohibits discrimination against students on the bases of sex/gender in federally funded education programs and activities.

A study by Harvard’s Civil Rights Project finds that schools were more segregated in 2000 than in 1970 when busing for desegregation began.

The law, which reauthorizes the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, holds schools accountable for student achievement levels and provides penalties for schools that do not make adequate yearly progress toward meeting the goals of No Child Left Behind

This ruling found that denying access to a school-based gay–straight alliance was a violation of the Federal Equal Access Act giving students the right to use facilities for extra curricular activities at any school that receives public funding—regardless of private standing or religious affiliation.

Proposition 227 was passed, making it illegal for teachers to speak Spanish in California public schools and by default, outlawing bilingual education in California.

School integration reaches its all-time high; almost 45% of Black students in the United States are attending majority-white schools.

The Supreme Court rejects tax exemptions for private religious schools that wish to discriminate based on race.

Section 504 prohibits discrimination against people with disabilities.

The Court approves busing, magnet schools, compensatory education and other tools as appropriate remedies to overcome the role of residential segregation in perpetuating racially segregated schools.

Law passed that required federal funding for training teachers to teach children with learning disabilities

The Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination based on race, color, sex, religion or national origin. It provided for the integration of schools and other public facilities.

Read about the impacts of the Civil Rights laws

A federal court orders public school integration and Governor Orval Faubus sends his National Guard to physically prevent nine African American students from enrolling at all-white Central High School. Reluctantly, President Eisenhower sends federal troops to enforce the court order, not because he supports desegregation, but because he can’t let a state governor use military…

On May 17th, the U.S. Supreme Court announces its decision in the case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, ruling that “separate educational facilities are inherently unequal,” thus overturning its previous ruling in the 1896 case of Plessey v. Ferguson. Brown v. Board of Education is actually a combination of five cases from…

The Lemon Grove school board decided to build a separate school for children of Mexican heritage without giving notice to their parents. On January 5, 1931, Lemon Grove Grammar School principal Jerome Green, acting under instructions from school trustees, turned away Mexican children at the schoolhouse door, directing them to the new school, which came to be known within the local Mexican American community as la caballeriza, meaning “the stable”. In Alvarez v. Lemon Grove this California Mexican American case was possibly the first successful court action in favor of school desegregation in the country.

Suggested Reading:

Brimner, L.D. (2021) Without separation: Prejudice, segregation and the case of Robert Alvarez. (Gonzalez, M. illus.) Calkins Creek Books.

Hale, C. (2019) Todos iguales – all equal. Children’s Book Press.

The first school for students with physical disabilities is opened

After the Civil War, and with the legal end of slavery, African Americans in the South make alliances with white Republicans to push for many political changes, including, for the first time, rewriting state constitutions to guarantee free public education. In practice, white children benefit more than Black children.

The Perkins School for the Blind was the first school to open for blind students. This school progressed and now serves students with other disabilities other than blindness.

Gallaudet University became Congressionally funded when President Lincoln signed the charter bill into law; President Ulysses S. Grant attended the first university commencement in 1869.

Gallaudet University is a private federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C. for the education of the deaf and hard of hearing. It was founded in 1864 as a grammar school for both deaf and blind children.

After being denied entry to a Rhode Island high school, Maritcha Lyons testified before the state in a campaign effort to desegregate RI schools. The campaign was successful and in 1869, Maritcha became the first Black graduate of Providence High School.

Read about Maritcha on Blackpast.org

Because she was Mexican American, Sylvia Mendez was not allowed to attend a nice school of her choice, but had to attend a run down school with poor conditions with other Mexican American children. Boys were taught vocational skills, and girls were taught sewing and home economics.

The Mendez family opened a lawsuit that challenged the school district, stating that their segregated schools were unconstitutional. The lawsuit helped bring about the end of school segregation in California. It also paved the way for the Brown v. Board of Education decision at the U.S. Supreme Court, which found segregation in public schools unconstitutional.

Online Resource: Mendez Case

Suggested Reading:

Tonatiuh, D. (2014) Separate is never equal: Sylvia Mendez and her family’s fight for desegregation. Abrams Publishing.

On her long walk to school, five year old Sarah Roberts passed by several other schools that were only for white children. Her father applied to the Boston Public School Committee to allow her to attend a school closer to their house but because his daughter had Black skin, his daughter was denied four times.

Online Article; Sarah Roberts Case

Suggested Reading:

Goodman, S, (2016) The First Step: How One Girl Put Segregation on Trial (Lewis, E.B., illus.) Bloomsbury Publishing.

Kendrick, S., Kendrick, P. (2006) Sarah’s long walk: The free blacks of Boston and how their struggle for equity changed America. Beacon Press.

He received a bachelor’s degree from Middlebury College in Vermont.

Also known as the “Forgotten School”, the Canterbury Female Boarding school made history when Sarah Harris, a young african-american woman wrote to the principal requesting to attend the school. The principal, Prudence Crandall agreed, which caused protests among the white residents of the town of Canterbury. In response, Crandall closed the school and re-opened it as a school for non-white students.

In September, 1834, a night time mob set fire to the school.

Prudence Crandall Museum, Canterbury CT

A Canterbury Tale: Connecticut’s Prudence Crandall Affair

California Department of Education revised the K–12 history/social science framework in the spirit of the FAIR Act.

The Fair Act adds lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans and persons with disabilities to the list of those including men and women, Native Americans, African Americans, Mexican Americans, Asian Americans, Pacific Islanders, European Americans and members of other ethnic and cultural groups whose contributions must be included in classroom instruction and materials.

In court cases, Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger the Supreme Court upholds diversity as a rationale for affirmative action programs in higher education admissions, but concludes that point systems are not appropriate.

GLSEN conducts its first National School Climate Survey to assess the experiences of LGBTQ youth with regards to their experiences of school-based harassment and victimization, the frequency with which they heard homophobic language in their schools, and their overall comfort in school. The survey is the first of its kind to examine the specific experiences of LGBTQ-identified youth in schools nationally

In 1999, Georgia passed the first school bullying law in the US.[ The rest of the US states followed suit, with the final state—Montana—passing its school bullying law in 2015.

In March of 1990, over 1000 people marched from the White House to the US capitol to demonstrate their support of the Americans with Disabilities Act. At the capitol, people with physical disabilities removed their mobility aids and wheelchairs and crawled up the Capitol steps to create a physical representation of the urgent need for accessible architecture.

Capitol Crawl by Linda Lengyel

First Gay-Straight Alliance was formed at Concord Academy in Concord, MA by a history teacher named Kevin Jennings.

Project 10 is widely recognized as the first organized effort to provide support for LGBTQ+ youth in schools across the United States.

The Briggs Initiative was a ballot measure in California in 1978 that would have prohibited “the advocating, soliciting, imposing, encouraging or promoting of private or public homosexual activity directed at, or likely to come to the attention of, schoolchildren and/or other employees.” The measure was defeated when California residents voted no on the measure.

The Briggs Initiative: A Scary Proposition – art installation 2018-2019

Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 prohibits discrimination based on gender in all aspects of education.

No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.

U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights

US Department of Education: Title IX

Public Law 911-230 made it a requirement that both students with and without disabilities were given a free, appropriate public education. The law required funds to be spent on gifted and talented students as well.