Inequality in education

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EDUCATIONAL FREEDOM IN URBAN AMERICA: BROWN V. BOARD AFTER HALF A CENTURY

Edited by David Salisbury and Casey Lartigue Jr.

Cato Institute, $24.95, 342 pages

Fifty years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court decided the landmark Brown v. Board of Education case and stopped segregated schools cold. Or did it?

Yes, the court ruled: "Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal." But the editors of this volume -- David Salisbury is head of educational studies at the Cato Institute, and Casey Lartigue is a research executive at the Fight for Children organization -- as well as their contributors (whose papers at a 2003 Cato educational conference are reprinted here) see unintended consequences from Brown v. Board.

They say inequality rages on 50 years later. For instance, 45 percent of black and 47 percent of Hispanic students drop out of public high schools (compared with 24 percent of whites).

Only 5 percent of black and 10 percent of Hispanic fourth-graders reach the math proficiency level set by the National AssessmentofEducational Progress (compared with 33 percent of whites).

Say the editors in the preface: "Minority children living in America's inner cities suffer disproportionately from a failing education system." They cite a 2003 report by the National Center for Educational Statistics, which shows that performance gaps between black and white students aged 13 to 17 have widened in the last decade.

Yes, reading this impressive book I see minority students falling behind in our public schools, but white students do little better. I think that Mr. Lartigue puts his finger on the cause, saying that public education, despite many "reforms," gets ever bureaucratized -- treated as a government monopoly, resistant to change.