Divided We Fail: The Story of an African American Community That Ended the Era of School Desegregation

by Sarah Garland

Examines why school desegregation, despite its success in closing the achievement gap, was never embraced wholeheartedly in the black community as a remedy for racial inequality
 
In 2007, a court case originally filed in Louisville, Kentucky, was argued before the Supreme Court and officially ended the era of school desegregation— both changing how schools across America handle race and undermining the most important civil rights cases of the last century. Of course, this wasn’t the first federal lawsuit to challenge school desegregation. But it was the first—and only—one brought by African Americans. In Divided We Fail, journalist Sarah Garland deftly and sensitively tells the stories of the families and individuals who fought for and against desegregation. By reframing how we commonly understand race, education, and the history of desegregation, this timely and deeply relevant book will be an important contribution to the continued struggle toward true racial equality.
 

Genres: Education, History, African American

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

There is more than one author with this name.

Sarah Garland is a staff writer at The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization based at Teachers College, Columbia University. She has written about education, crime and immigration for the New York Times, Newsweek, the Atlantic, the Washington Post, the Philadelphia Inquirer, Newsday, Washington Monthly, Marie Claire, the American Prospect, among others. She is a 2009 recipient of the Spencer Fellowship in Education Reporting at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and received her master’s degree from New York University as a Henry M. MacCracken fellow. Her first book, Gangs in Garden City: How Immigration, Segregation and Youth Violence Are Changing America’s Suburbs, was published by Nation Books in July 2009 and was a runner up for an Investigative Reporters and Editor award in 2010. She was a finalist for a 2011 Deadline Club award for her Washington Monthly story about the New York City schools. She has been a guest on the Diane Rehm Show, the Leonard Lopate Show, PBS NewsHour, Word of Mouth with Virginia Prescott, Bloomberg EDU with Jane Williams, Here and Now, and has appeared several times on MSNBC. Sarah is originally from Louisville, Kentucky and now lives in New York City.

Reviews

[Lindsay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won this book through the First Reads giveaway program. The views expressed below are my own.

Sarah Garland does an excellent job examining an extremely complicated Supreme Court case and providing the human framework behind it. I was in law school when this case was handed down, and I took Constitutional Law II in the fall of 2007, a mere two months after this case was handed down. My professor warned us it would be tricky and difficult to understand, but we'd get through it. So I really, really commend the author for being able to break it down and explain the arguments and theories behind the case in a way that a layperson could understand.

Yet it was the history and the people she chronicled that really kept my interest. Too often when you study case law, you don't get to know who the plaintiffs really are. This book gives you the opportunity to really learn what the Louisville schools were like before desegregation, during, and, now, after. The focus on individual people's stories help you understand why they are motivated to act they way they do. After all, to an outsider it's easy to dismiss Riccardo X's desire to have an Afrocentric classroom as the weird delusions of a Black Panther-esque person, until you learn why he believes it's better for the black children, based on his own experiences.

The book also makes you question your own experiences in school. I'm just a couple years younger than Je'Mekia and Dionne. I personally went to school in a suburb of Flint. My school had maybe 5 black kids total; I remember 1 girl in particular from elementary school. But then I was in honors classes and AP classes, and there were exactly zero black kids there with me in those classes. I remember when the first black family moved into my suburban neighborhood, and there was talk of property values decreasing, what would happen next, and this was in 1995 for Pete's sake! So I can understand completely why the school system didn't want to give up on diversifying their schools, even if the way it was accomplishing that created unintended consequences.

The only reason I didn't give this book 5 stars is that I feel it dove into the past a little too quickly after setting up the chain of events for the court case (Dionne and Je'Mekia not getting into Central High School). I didn't really understand why were going so far back into history until I figured out what the author was doing.

Overall, Divided We Fail does an excellent job explaining why a black community would even consider ending desegregation. It's thought-provoking, and it gives a human element to a thorny issue. I highly recommend it!

[Joey Georgen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Title: Divided we Fail
Author: Sarah Garland
Genre: Nonfiction
Publication date: 2013

Divided we Fail takes place during the time period of desegregation and the struggles that came with making those drastic changes to a population that didn't all want them. The book centers around the location of Central high school in , and shows the opposition faced at every turn when trying to achieve an equal education system. We are introduced to a few people and get a glimpse in their long and hard histories. And these are people of all different social classes, ages, jobs, and races. The stories all converge on Central high school, which, due to white flight and a state desegregation plan, is threatened with closure. The story culminates in a court case that results in the end for schools desegregation.

That may sound like a bad thing; to end desegregation in schools however the story surprised me by it's showing of all the sides and how there is not really any antagonist. Everyone is placed in unfamiliar and uncomfortable positions that result in a decision that only further escalates the problem. It doesn't work on a big scale or at a small scale and no one person or group of people are to blame. This makes the dynamic of the story feel so much more filled out and developed.

For example, the book shows us a desegregation plan that would bus black students to high schools that were equal in number of black and white students to avoid unequal teaching and as a response to white flight. However we then see this plan is not good for anyone and causes black people to have to bus hours to go to school, experience blatant racism, and still not received a higher education than the schools nearby. From this new perspective our ideas change and the book continues to juggle the opposing viewpoints untill we are left with the underlying idea that everyone is doing the best that they can, but no one thing is going to fix this problem.

It's this lack of villainizing that portrays people as people and gives us the perspective that the problem is not solved simply by acknowledging it and requires time and effort to succeed. It further emphasizes that we should continue to work towards the solution to problems we face today. The author does not shy away from showing every side, including ones the reader may not agree with and presents the information factually and only biased by the character in the story.

I was surprised when reading this book because it was less of a story recounting history books and giving life lessons heard a hundred times, but a full picture of individuals who struggled with everyday life in a world filled with prejudice and change in a factual way. A large portion of the material is boring and drags on with it's explanation and overanalyzing, but the themes demonstrated by this book outweigh the less interesting storytelling. I would not have read this book on my own time nor on my own choice, but having read the book I appreciate it and the profound way it tackles this difficult topic.

[Payton]

Title: Divided We Fail
Author: Sarah Garland
Genre: Nonfiction
Publication Date: 2013

In Divided We Fail is about the 2007 court case which followed the Louisville, Kentucky court cases and the individuals who fought both for and against desegregation. This case was determined to be the first and only lawsuit that challenged desegregation that was run by African Americans.

This book takes place before and after 2007, but it mostly follows the lawsuit against the Louisville, Kentucky school system. Throughout the book Racism is a huge a issue, of course with the African American students being rightfully rejected. This book addresses the racism that still exists in the world and how people missed millions of opportunity's just because the color of their skin.

In my opinion, the biggest selling point is the reaction to the letters in the first three chapters. Reading heartbreaking scenes had me emotionally invested through the whole book. Defiantly a warning I would give just the amount of anger you feel along with a whole lot of legal talk. Seeing as this book takes us through a whole court case, there are most definitely t a bunch of legal terms. Personally, my biggest takeaway is that life ins't always fair and despite that life can turn out amazing.

[Sara Gilbert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Immaculate content……. Poor organization of the book itself and could’ve been better executed. Still think everyone would benefit from reading this. I learned mostly a lot about bussing that I didn’t know before. * fantastic book for a book club discussion. You’ll def want to yap about it/talk through it.

[Madison Pickett · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very insightful. All teachers of Louisville should read.

[Stacie Wyatt · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read Divided We Fail, in exchange for review from Netgalley.com. The book was written by Sara Garland and published by Beacon Press.

The book discusses how schools used to admit (or not admit) students based on race. Students would be bussed to other schools to receive a sub-par education. For example, the book discussed Central high. Local students were being bussed to a different, sub-par school, while the higher quality school in the neighborhood, was set for closure. To maintain an open status, Central high had to have a Caucasian majority, but the school did not attract enough Caucasians. According to the book, no school in that district could have more than 42% African-American population to ensure compliance.

The African-American parents were upset. Send the kids to the closer, better school. A lawsuit followed and the school was allowed to remain open. The Caucasians also sued because their children could not attend their school of choice.

The book basically discusses the Central High case because it was brought together by an African-American community. The African-American communities were facing teacher firings and school closings once desegregation ended. The firings and closings led to an increase in protests and lawsuits.

I also enjoyed the story of Dionne. Dionne wanted to be a lawyer and thought Central High's law magnet program will be a starting point to achieving her dreams. She applied for admission to the school around 1996. She been wanting to be apart of the program since middle school. The letter said she was being considered for admission to Central High. Her mother received another letter, asking about first and second choice schools, just in case Central did not accept Dionne. Dionne already had to be bussed over an hour away to attend Elementary and middle school, even though another elementary school was in walking distance. Dionne was rejected for Central high because the middle school sent her transcripts to her house, instead of the school. She was placed in her regular high school but she missed orientation because the letter arrived late. Dionne was an interesting story and chapter to read.

I highly recommend this book to anyone, wanting to hear more about desegregation and how this community fought to end it.

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Being that my spouse is an alum of the Louisville school system, and my nieces are currently being educated in it I found this an interesting book. It relates how the school busing system was overturned in Louisville. Louisville's system was considered one of the most successful in the country at integrating schools, but by the early 2000s black students were having difficulty getting in to the schools of their choice in the system because of the cap on the number of black students allowed in any one school. Several students and parents assembled a lawsuit challenging these caps, which later lawsuits used as a basis to overturn the busing program completely.

Garland writes compellingly, but doesn't provide any answers. The reader is introduced to both supporters of busing and those who have worked to prevent or overturn busing laws. Garland informs us that statistically black students have been more successful under the busing system, but she also introduces us to individual black students who may have been better off without. For me this book was a clear reminder that racism, especially the subtle racism that feeds modern "white flight", can not be legislated away. Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream is still only partially fulfilled.

[Dawn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway. To put it mildly, the issues surrounding race in our country are complicated. I am always intrigued when this topic (one most seem to shy away from as too thorny,too fraught with emotion,too controversial) is explored. This book discusses school desegregation, and the years following it, particularly in the city of Louisville, Kentucky. This is they story of the courts, the school system, and the ordinary citizens who grappled with the issues surrounding school desegregation. There were and still are no easy answers. What once appeared to me as a very black and white (no pun intended) case of desegregation as a positive thing no longer seems even remotely so after reading this book. I highly recommend this book if you are interested in the education and the rights of all our children, and how the legal system, urban planning, politics, and race inform the educational system of our country. Eye opening.

[David Lucander · Rating 3 out of 5]

Garland certainly did her research on this book, but it's not something I'd recommend or assign over the litany of Jonathan Kozol books on the subject of race and schooling. There are a lot of characters to keep track of, pictures of individuals or schools, as well as maps of Louisville, would have been nice to help visualize the landscape and major players. I liked chapter 4 the most, but that's my historian bias. I wish the author wrote a stronger and more impassioned epilogue or afterword, something that let her insight and wit really shine. It seems to me like an equitable and effective way to run schools would be to have funding per pupil be the same for all schools within a county, but what the heck do I know?

[Jonas Persson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a topic that interests me, and learning about the back story and some history of segregation and desegregation was educational.

I would have given this book four stars of it wasn't for the overly complicated way it is written. I felt the story lacked a good flow and was sometimes confused as to what year the events I was reading about took place. There were other details that temporal confused me, as well, like how Teddy Gordon was sometimes referred to as Teddy and sometimes Gordon. When you already have plenty of characters to keep track of, that just served as an added headache.

To summerize: an interesting topic, but a difficult read.

[Patrick Tierney · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ms. Garland effectively highlights the personal stories that led to the lawsuits that greatly impacted school assignment systems in our country. Her interviews with some of the key players in the story, including some who were most impacted by the past failures of the system, is where the book is at it's best. It's fascinating to learn their views on the current educational assignment system. The book is less successful when explaining the progression of particular cases, when the narrative gets a bit tangled.

[Amy (DemonKittie) · Rating 4 out of 5]

*This book was won from a First Reads giveaway on goodreads.com*

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well written. Provides great insight into little known events. I truly enjoyed having this glimpse into history. Learned lots of info from this book.

[Mike Higgins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good, but I was hoping for more detail on the legal arguments and opinions.

[Jaclyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Disorganized in its delivery but an important case study that I would still highly suggest.