By Chris Braunlich,
More than 70 years ago, black and white students in Virginia received separate and very unequal educations.
In They Closed Their Schools, author Bob Smith writes that in Farmville, a city not unlike the rest of Virginia, the white public school built after a 1939 fire “had a gymnasium, cafeteria, locker rooms, infirmary and an auditorium with fixed seats.” Moton High School, built for black students in 1939, had none of these. Constructed to accommodate 180 students, by 1950 it held 470 – so many that the school held three classes in the auditorium (“one on stage, two in the back”), and occasionally a class on the school bus. The white schools had none of that.
Those buses had been discarded by the white schools, as were the textbooks, as were other supplies. Teachers were paid about 40 percent less than white counterparts. And the curriculum for black students emphasized vocational training, especially agriculture … which coincidentally allowed courses to be taught outdoors and relieve the overcrowding that forced students to be taught in “tarpaper shacks.”
That dual system muddled along for nearly four decades until, in 1951, 16-year-old Barbara Johns shined a spotlight on it when she led students in a walk-out to demand equal education. She faced opposition not only from a white education establishment but also from an older generation of black leaders worn down by time. Her own attorneys, notably Oliver Hill, questioned the effort but ultimately the light she shone resulted in her cause becoming part of Brown v. Board of Education.
Over time (too much time), educational inputs narrowed significantly. But educational outcomes remained lower than desired and achievement gaps remained large.
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