Segregation's Impact and the Pursuit of School Integration

In Brown v. Board of Education, the United States Supreme Court ruled unanimously that racial segregation of children in public schools was unconstitutional. The court recognized that separate but equal is not, in fact, equal and mandated desegregation. However, 70 years later, schools and neighborhoods across America are largely more segregated than they were in the 1950s and 1960s, and the schools that primarily serve Black and Brown children are still under-resourced.

This report seeks to foster conversations about what integration actually means and functionally looks like. It evaluates school integration as a means of addressing pressing issues of education equity and racial justice, utilizing Beaumont, Texas, as an example of how integration efforts have failed in the past, manifest today, and could succeed in the future.

We start the report with definitions of segregation and integration and move into a discussion of the history of neighborhood and school segregation both generally and in Beaumont specifically. Our historical review is then supplemented by a mixed-method analysis of the current state of schools in Beaumont ISD, pulling data from the U.S. Census, Texas Education Agency, and Beaumont ISD to investigate how Beaumont ISD compares to other school districts in Jefferson County in terms of school and neighborhood demographics and school characteristics. Finally, our report is bolstered by the voices of the community by documenting the lived experiences of students, teachers, and community leaders in Beaumont by conducting interviews and focus groups. We end with a series of recommendations aimed at ensuring true and equitable integration in Beaumont.

This report acknowledges that much work remains to fulfill Brown's promise, and Texans in communities like Beaumont are ready to make forward progress.