562: The Problem We All Live With
JUL 31, 2015
Right now, all sorts of people are trying to rethink and reinvent education, to get poor minority kids performing as well as white kids. But there's one thing nobody tries anymore, despite lots of evidence that it works: desegregation. Nikole Hannah-Jones looks at a district that, not long ago, accidentally launched a desegregation program. First of a two-part series.
- Ira speaks with New York Times Magazine Reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones about her years reporting on education and the various kinds of school reforms administrators have tried to close the achievement gap that never seem to work. Nikole says there's one reform that people have pretty much given up on, despite a lot of evidence that it works – school integration. (11 minutes)
- Nikole Hannah-Jones reports on a school district that accidentally stumbled on an integration program in recent years. It's the Normandy School District in Normandy, Missouri. Normandy is on the border of Ferguson, Missouri, and the district includes the high school that Michael Brown attended. (30 minutes)
- Nikole Hannah-Jones' story on the Normandy school district from the first part of the show continues. (14 minutes)Nikole also wrote about Normandy for ProPublica.And Elisa Crouch's article in St Louis Dispatch that documented the day in the life of one Normandy senior is here.
Photo
Norman Rockwell's painting "The Problem We All Live With" depicting Ruby Bridges – the first black child to attend an all white elementary school in the South. Image from the website of the Norman Rockwell Museum.
