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Integrated: How American Schools Failed Black Children
A powerful, incisive reckoning with the impacts of school desegregation that traces four generations of the author’s family to show how integration decimated Black school systems and was a disservice to much of the Black community
On May 17, 1954 the landmark case Brown v. Board of Education deemed racial segregation in schools unconstitutional. Heralded as a massive victory for civil rights, the decision's goal was to give Black students equal access to educational opportunities and clear a path to a better future. Yet in the years following the ruling, schools in predominantly Black neighborhoods were shuttered or saw their funding dwindle; Black educators were fired en masse; and Black students faced discrimination and violence from their white peers as they joined resource-rich schools that were ill-prepared for the influx of additional students.
Award-winning interdisciplinary scholar of education and Black history Noliwe Rooks weaves together sociological data and cultural history to challenge the idea that integration was a boon for Black people. She shows how present-day discrimination lawsuits directly stem from the mistakes made during integration. She tells the story of her grandparents, who were among the thousands of Black teachers fired following the Brown decision; of her father, who was traumatized by his experiences at a predominantly white school; of her own experiences moving from a flourishing, racially diverse school to an underserved inner-city one; and finally, of her son and his Black peers, who struggle with hostility and prejudice from white teachers and white students alike.
At once assiduously researched and deeply engaging, Integrated proves how education has remained both a tool for community progress and a seemingly inscrutable cultural puzzle. Rooks's deft hand turns the story of integration's past and future on its head, and shows how to better understand and support generations of students to come.
On May 17, 1954 the landmark case Brown v. Board of Education deemed racial segregation in schools unconstitutional. Heralded as a massive victory for civil rights, the decision's goal was to give Black students equal access to educational opportunities and clear a path to a better future. Yet in the years following the ruling, schools in predominantly Black neighborhoods were shuttered or saw their funding dwindle; Black educators were fired en masse; and Black students faced discrimination and violence from their white peers as they joined resource-rich schools that were ill-prepared for the influx of additional students.
Award-winning interdisciplinary scholar of education and Black history Noliwe Rooks weaves together sociological data and cultural history to challenge the idea that integration was a boon for Black people. She shows how present-day discrimination lawsuits directly stem from the mistakes made during integration. She tells the story of her grandparents, who were among the thousands of Black teachers fired following the Brown decision; of her father, who was traumatized by his experiences at a predominantly white school; of her own experiences moving from a flourishing, racially diverse school to an underserved inner-city one; and finally, of her son and his Black peers, who struggle with hostility and prejudice from white teachers and white students alike.
At once assiduously researched and deeply engaging, Integrated proves how education has remained both a tool for community progress and a seemingly inscrutable cultural puzzle. Rooks's deft hand turns the story of integration's past and future on its head, and shows how to better understand and support generations of students to come.
269 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 18, 2025
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About the author
Noliwe Rooks
7 books51 followersNoliwe Rooks is the director of American studies at Cornell University and was for ten years the associate director of African American studies at Princeton University. She is the author of Cutting School (The New Press) as well as White Money/Black Power and Hair Raising . She lives in Ithaca, New York.
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Did not finish
February 12, 2026Read the first 50 pages or so. I picked this up after hearing a black colleague talk about how segregation had its benefits for black people, as this is a book by a black academic making that same point and I was curious to learn more. Essentially, the author points out that some segregated schools offered a good education, with the advantages of being a community focal point and of students not having to deal with racism and associated low academic expectations at school. Also, integration caused large numbers of black teachers and administrators to lose their jobs. This was interesting to learn, but the book seems poorly organized and often vague, spending a lot of time on things most Americans paying attention already know (racist violence, de facto segregation and how little money is allocated to disadvantaged schools, etc.). Important topic but I wasn’t feeling this particular book.
June 13, 2025
RC/Book Overall: 5/5
Audiobook/ Narration: 4/5
Audiobook/ Narration: 4/5
March 22, 2025
5⭐️ RTC!
February 20, 2025
There was so much important history in this book, most of it I did not know. The stories were inspiring, hopeful, and heartbreaking. There was a lovely balance between the author’s personal history and general history, policies, and national legislature. The content was challenging, but Rooks made it feel accessible.
The book centers around Brown v. Board, the history leading up to the case, and the aftermath. One of the first steps in the massive undertaking of reform of systemic racism in schools is education on what that looked like in the past and what it still looks like today. America did not set up Black students to succeed and took away many of the resources obtained before Brown v. Board. I was fascinated by how many Black Americans were against desegregation, as it’s always taught as a progressive, positive act. Integration, as it was done, was done without a plan and left Black students vulnerable to an increase in racism that left their school lives no longer safe. Racism in America is rampant, and the three generations of stories Rook shares show that.
I grew up in a school with METCO and have always been so interested in how a system like that improved anything — it’s taxing on the student’s mental and physical wellbeing. It tries to solve a problem by inconveniencing the people it is presumed to help.
I am angry and sad and so glad I was able to read this book. Thank you to the publisher, Noliwe Rooks and NetGalley, for giving me the opportunity to read this in exchange for an honest review.
The book centers around Brown v. Board, the history leading up to the case, and the aftermath. One of the first steps in the massive undertaking of reform of systemic racism in schools is education on what that looked like in the past and what it still looks like today. America did not set up Black students to succeed and took away many of the resources obtained before Brown v. Board. I was fascinated by how many Black Americans were against desegregation, as it’s always taught as a progressive, positive act. Integration, as it was done, was done without a plan and left Black students vulnerable to an increase in racism that left their school lives no longer safe. Racism in America is rampant, and the three generations of stories Rook shares show that.
I grew up in a school with METCO and have always been so interested in how a system like that improved anything — it’s taxing on the student’s mental and physical wellbeing. It tries to solve a problem by inconveniencing the people it is presumed to help.
I am angry and sad and so glad I was able to read this book. Thank you to the publisher, Noliwe Rooks and NetGalley, for giving me the opportunity to read this in exchange for an honest review.
February 13, 2025
Damn. I’ve really been consuming some dark nonfiction lately, but honestly isn’t that just a sign of the times??? Look at where the Department of Education is headed…
I am so thankful to Pantheon Books, PRH Audio, and Noliwe Rooks for granting me advanced physical and audio access to this powerful piece before it hits shelves on March 18, 2025.
Our author reminisces on her family’s struggle with the desegregation of schools and how the aftermath brought on a world of hate to children, families, and educators of color, providing so much disservice to the Black communities. We all know about the infamous Brown v Board of Education case of 1954, that sought to introduce integrated schools, but of course it wasn’t an easily agreed upon or adopted ruling.
A slew of hateful messages and actions were sent out by white parents and governing bodies, seeking to reverse this ruling and harbor discrimination and prejudice towards black students and teachers seeking to advance in life, closing doors on opportunities and systemic issues.
It’s so fucked up to know this occurred, but I can’t say I’m surprised given the lack of accommodation this country maintains in any given period of time. This was an eye opener for me, and I hope more people are able to understand its message.
I am so thankful to Pantheon Books, PRH Audio, and Noliwe Rooks for granting me advanced physical and audio access to this powerful piece before it hits shelves on March 18, 2025.
Our author reminisces on her family’s struggle with the desegregation of schools and how the aftermath brought on a world of hate to children, families, and educators of color, providing so much disservice to the Black communities. We all know about the infamous Brown v Board of Education case of 1954, that sought to introduce integrated schools, but of course it wasn’t an easily agreed upon or adopted ruling.
A slew of hateful messages and actions were sent out by white parents and governing bodies, seeking to reverse this ruling and harbor discrimination and prejudice towards black students and teachers seeking to advance in life, closing doors on opportunities and systemic issues.
It’s so fucked up to know this occurred, but I can’t say I’m surprised given the lack of accommodation this country maintains in any given period of time. This was an eye opener for me, and I hope more people are able to understand its message.
February 14, 2026
I tend to think of school integration as something that happened in history: Brown v Board of Education, the Little Rock Nine, Ruby Bridges. But many metro schools are still over 90 percent segregated -- moreso than even the 1940s.
The author of this book shares the history of integration in schools, and not just during the civil rights era. She includes her personal experience as being the only Black kid in her elementary school (a rather neutral experience) and the story of her son, who, in spite of being at an elite private school, was placed in lower math groups basically because of his race. The author argues that integration is not just a "southern issue;" northern states may actually be less integrated than their southern counterparts (in fact, her son's experience happened in Princeton, which she assumed would be progressive and impartial).
I thought it was interesting that the segregated Black schools in the south had also doubled as gathering places for the Black community, and when the schools integrated, that gathering place was often lost.
It's definitely sobering to realize just how adamantly opposed White people were to Black students attending with their children. Whether these grown adults were protesting or assaulting the brave students (like the Little Rock Nine) or whether they quietly moved to the suburbs, many White people simply refused to let their children go to school with Black children. At the same time, White people in power were adamantly against Black schools and communities being given adequate resources for success.
I had never considered the idea of integrating the faculty (not just the students), but when the author expounded on this solution, it seemed like such an obvious benefit: literal children wouldn't have had to bear the brunt of racist rage (not that anyone deserves that), and black students would have mentors in place when they integrated a few years later. But I'm sure racism would have prevented this path, as well; so many parents wouldn't have wanted a Black teacher having authority over their White child.
Finally, I appreciated the author noting how political education is: "education is politics by other means." She notes that politicians will often use education as a tool to sway voters but then drop the issues after elected. I have seen how our education system has been manipulated by politicians (whether race is in the equation or not) and it is infuriating.
Overall I learned so much by reading this book. So informative.
Also don't miss:
-Warriors Don't Cry by Melba Pattillo Beals (memoir) (seriously everyone should read this)
-The Lions of Little Rock by Kristen Levine (middle grade fiction)
-Carlotta's New Dress by Carlotta Walls LaNier (nonfiction picture book; don't skip the author's note)
The author of this book shares the history of integration in schools, and not just during the civil rights era. She includes her personal experience as being the only Black kid in her elementary school (a rather neutral experience) and the story of her son, who, in spite of being at an elite private school, was placed in lower math groups basically because of his race. The author argues that integration is not just a "southern issue;" northern states may actually be less integrated than their southern counterparts (in fact, her son's experience happened in Princeton, which she assumed would be progressive and impartial).
I thought it was interesting that the segregated Black schools in the south had also doubled as gathering places for the Black community, and when the schools integrated, that gathering place was often lost.
It's definitely sobering to realize just how adamantly opposed White people were to Black students attending with their children. Whether these grown adults were protesting or assaulting the brave students (like the Little Rock Nine) or whether they quietly moved to the suburbs, many White people simply refused to let their children go to school with Black children. At the same time, White people in power were adamantly against Black schools and communities being given adequate resources for success.
I had never considered the idea of integrating the faculty (not just the students), but when the author expounded on this solution, it seemed like such an obvious benefit: literal children wouldn't have had to bear the brunt of racist rage (not that anyone deserves that), and black students would have mentors in place when they integrated a few years later. But I'm sure racism would have prevented this path, as well; so many parents wouldn't have wanted a Black teacher having authority over their White child.
Finally, I appreciated the author noting how political education is: "education is politics by other means." She notes that politicians will often use education as a tool to sway voters but then drop the issues after elected. I have seen how our education system has been manipulated by politicians (whether race is in the equation or not) and it is infuriating.
Overall I learned so much by reading this book. So informative.
Also don't miss:
-Warriors Don't Cry by Melba Pattillo Beals (memoir) (seriously everyone should read this)
-The Lions of Little Rock by Kristen Levine (middle grade fiction)
-Carlotta's New Dress by Carlotta Walls LaNier (nonfiction picture book; don't skip the author's note)
July 4, 2025
This was interesting. Of course I remember learning about Brown vs Board of Education, and we've all seen the pictures of the National Guard standing outside the school as black students walked in. What I don't ever remember learning about it what came after. I was led to believe (or at least allowed to assume) that school integration was a success and there were a few issues at the start but things eventually calmed down. Well, based on what this book, Integrated: How American Schools Failed Black Children, that's the furthest thing from the truth.
I had no idea the state and/or county governments pulled school funding, closed schools, and so much worse. All in an effort to stop school desegregation. Some black schools were set on fire, people were targeted and harassed. It was certainly not a happy and easy time.
Something I never thought about, or never told, is that there were well funded and well-staffed segregated black schools and there was equal push back from some black residents/parents who also did not want to desegregate. This is not something taught in schools. I don't recall the book explaining how many black schools were "good" and how many were struggling and would have (theoretically) benefited from desegregation.
There is a lot of information and history shared in this book, and I do recommend if you want to learn more from a different perspective.
3 stars only because I wanted to learn more about who was helped by desegregation, and not only about the negative impacts, which were plentiful.
I had no idea the state and/or county governments pulled school funding, closed schools, and so much worse. All in an effort to stop school desegregation. Some black schools were set on fire, people were targeted and harassed. It was certainly not a happy and easy time.
Something I never thought about, or never told, is that there were well funded and well-staffed segregated black schools and there was equal push back from some black residents/parents who also did not want to desegregate. This is not something taught in schools. I don't recall the book explaining how many black schools were "good" and how many were struggling and would have (theoretically) benefited from desegregation.
There is a lot of information and history shared in this book, and I do recommend if you want to learn more from a different perspective.
3 stars only because I wanted to learn more about who was helped by desegregation, and not only about the negative impacts, which were plentiful.
March 14, 2025
Oh what a timely read.
This was such a good, informative read about the desegregation of schools and the aftermath. The absolute hate and racism in this book hurt so much. But unfortunately not surprised. INTEGRATED takes a deep dive into the 1954 case of Brown v Board of Education and the years following.
I read this one via audio, and it’s read by the author - which I alway prefer in my nonfiction.
Highly recommend for your next nonfiction read.
This was such a good, informative read about the desegregation of schools and the aftermath. The absolute hate and racism in this book hurt so much. But unfortunately not surprised. INTEGRATED takes a deep dive into the 1954 case of Brown v Board of Education and the years following.
I read this one via audio, and it’s read by the author - which I alway prefer in my nonfiction.
Highly recommend for your next nonfiction read.
May 13, 2025
Overall, I think this is worth reading for a more in-depth history of desegregation than you usually get. It mostly fulfilled my hopes of learning a little more about how the US north was never desegregated like the south. This is also a rare case where the author going into personal stories is fine: her family was highly involved with the social movements in question.
There are a lot of potential complaints one could level, though. The arguments seem conflicting on multiple issues, raising contradictory elements without exploring how they operate together. There are troublingly few footnotes, which isn't just a matter of principle: on several occasions I wanted to learn more and couldn't. But I think the heart of the book is the history of desegregation, and a book that does its core job well deserves a good rating.
There are a lot of potential complaints one could level, though. The arguments seem conflicting on multiple issues, raising contradictory elements without exploring how they operate together. There are troublingly few footnotes, which isn't just a matter of principle: on several occasions I wanted to learn more and couldn't. But I think the heart of the book is the history of desegregation, and a book that does its core job well deserves a good rating.
March 7, 2026
3.5⭐️ A research-driven book that tackles important issues in education and raises meaningful questions about systemic racism in the education system. While the author draws on extensive research and highlights experiences that are often overlooked, the book felt somewhat disorganized at times, and much of it centres on negative historical experiences (in the US) rather than what meaningful change might look like moving forward. As someone working in the field, the book did prompt me to reflect on my own experiences, biases, the environmental and systemic challenges involved, and the students I encounter in my work, but I wish there were a clearer through-line and more exploration of what change and reform could look like in practice. (Plus, it’s a book about American education system.)
May 12, 2025
I felt this book was especially important to pick up for me so I can learn how to best help the underprivileged students near me as a volunteer tutor. I think anyone working in education can benefit from this read if they feel like they’re lacking perspective on this community of people.
Integrated gives a detailed history on how integration efforts affected the quality of education for students, and also how it affected the Black men and women who worked in education at unintegrated schools, something I had never thought about before.
This history begins before integration occurs until current day, showing how integration efforts lead to inequities that still affect nonwhite students in current day schools.
I would’ve loved to hear more about how these inequities personally affect this students during their education and their lives and families after the fact. We got a little of this in the book, but I know there is so much more to talk about and spread awareness of.
Thank you to Pantheon for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.
Integrated gives a detailed history on how integration efforts affected the quality of education for students, and also how it affected the Black men and women who worked in education at unintegrated schools, something I had never thought about before.
This history begins before integration occurs until current day, showing how integration efforts lead to inequities that still affect nonwhite students in current day schools.
I would’ve loved to hear more about how these inequities personally affect this students during their education and their lives and families after the fact. We got a little of this in the book, but I know there is so much more to talk about and spread awareness of.
Thank you to Pantheon for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.
July 18, 2025
So much history that just isn’t taught. You learn about brown v. The board of education and desegregation attempts in the south, but then the story just stops. Except it didn’t stop for millions of black children, it went on and on, well into the 70’s and 80’s and still to this day in more microaggressive ways. This is a really dark look at how pervasive and systemic racism has shaped our education system and how we continuously fail black and brown children before they even get a chance. Tough but important read especially in the current climate.
May 3, 2025
An excellent history of the resistance to integration. Gave me lots to think about structures in education at the macro level as well as at the schools I have and do work in.
Read
March 8, 2026not rating bc nonfic/informational but really great for me to read as an educator. So important to be knowledgeable about our systems and systems’ history.
June 25, 2025
Thought provoking and important work on the current state of education for students of color.
February 28, 2026
It’s always a goal to concentrate reading fiction and nonfiction celebrating black history/authors/issues in February and this is how I came to consider this book. However I was further interested in reading it as someone who experienced desegregation tactics in the 1970s. I’ve always wondered if the way the schools in my area set to achieve it was helpful and if so what were the impacts/upsides/downsides.
That said I got a lot more to think about reading this which covered decades of solutions missteps pushback and inequalities in the education of black populations.
My feeling as I discovered and learned from this book was a constant shaking of my white privileged head. How absolutely exhausting it must be to fight and fight and fight for equality. I simply can’t fathom how tiring and loaded with dissolution and constant dissatisfaction that must be like.
Growing up just outside of DC when busing was instituted in the county where I lived in 1973 (a third grader at that time so similar age to this author) I have an elementary school child’s memory of that experience. I was never bused from my neighborhood schools but about half my classmates were. Halfway through third grade busing began and students disappeared to be replaced by other students from another neighborhood that I knew nothing of. The new students were all black. This was my first day to day experiences with black peers. I don’t remember any discussions in my home or by my parents or neighbors of push back to the busing- that might have been different had I had to be bused out of my community. I remember money was found to have an activity bus after the normal bus so that the kids bused in could participate in any after school activates and still have a ride back home. There were already black teachers at my school before busing started probably less than a third. That may have helped. But though I was friendly with a group of black girls in elementary school during and after school activities the friendships (other than Robin with whom I talked on the phone every night for easily an hour) never went beyond school. Then I realized when I started junior high that NONE of the black kids I knew from elementary were there. I had no idea they wouldn’t just move to the same junior high as me and I felt a loss… would I ever see them again. It didn’t occur to me that wouldn’t be a thing. Made some new friends in junior high with kids bused from different neighborhoods and at the end of junior high they also then went somewhere else. This seemed like poor planning… that was my 9th grade thought.
By the time I got to high school I was a slight minority at my school. I’d guess about 40pct white. Busing was still happening but the areas that pulled into my high school were already more desegregated than my earlier schools. I don’t remember there being a lot of angst between students of different races. Some students hung in all white or all black crowds but there was plenty of mixing. Our student council president was black as were other members of that committee and we all got along well.
My husband was bused out of his community in the same county different neighborhood. He remembers having both white and black teachers and making black friends and other than some families leaving public education for catholic schools doesn’t remember a lot of push back. He did however experience more fighting and anger amongst the student body the schools he was sent to and he said the long bus rides and lack of feeling that they belonged where they were schooled were pretty general feelings among his neighborhood peers.
Busing went on for absolute decades in that county… easily until the 90s when by that time so many of the neighborhoods in the county were already desegregated but they kept busing kids. By the time we had kids we hated the idea of them spending long times on buses to be at school outside of their community.
I always wondered what were the effects of all the black kids removed from their communities. It always seemed so devastating to my younger self. I don’t know because all the kids I knew who had been bused in from 3-9th grade I never saw again.
There were disappointments in high school. AP courses disappeared every year and replaced by more remedial classes… and foreign languages taught went from 7 down to 3. I definitely felt I didn’t get a good high school education. I left school half day in 12th grade because all the APs I would have taken weren’t available and I had to pay my way to college
Myself and I knew leaving to work half day would serve me better.
From the book the idea that community schools would serve kids in their own communities but build in protections for poor communities by also providing meals and health and tutoring seems less jarring than busing kids. But then also I can’t imagine my education having been in all white populations. I think I would have definitely been poorly served by not knowing and learning with a diverse community of people and races.
It is heartbreaking to hear some of what the authors son experienced. Anger inducing. Frustrating. Educating everyone well and fairly regardless of race and background and income should be a no brainer as a goal of decency and good. We are so far from that mindset and slipping even further under the current regime. I can only hope that pockets of people are still fighting and discovering and coming up with educational ideas that can bring everyone up to the highest education standard possible but man is it exhausting to think of the continual and constant fight to bring that about.
That said I got a lot more to think about reading this which covered decades of solutions missteps pushback and inequalities in the education of black populations.
My feeling as I discovered and learned from this book was a constant shaking of my white privileged head. How absolutely exhausting it must be to fight and fight and fight for equality. I simply can’t fathom how tiring and loaded with dissolution and constant dissatisfaction that must be like.
Growing up just outside of DC when busing was instituted in the county where I lived in 1973 (a third grader at that time so similar age to this author) I have an elementary school child’s memory of that experience. I was never bused from my neighborhood schools but about half my classmates were. Halfway through third grade busing began and students disappeared to be replaced by other students from another neighborhood that I knew nothing of. The new students were all black. This was my first day to day experiences with black peers. I don’t remember any discussions in my home or by my parents or neighbors of push back to the busing- that might have been different had I had to be bused out of my community. I remember money was found to have an activity bus after the normal bus so that the kids bused in could participate in any after school activates and still have a ride back home. There were already black teachers at my school before busing started probably less than a third. That may have helped. But though I was friendly with a group of black girls in elementary school during and after school activities the friendships (other than Robin with whom I talked on the phone every night for easily an hour) never went beyond school. Then I realized when I started junior high that NONE of the black kids I knew from elementary were there. I had no idea they wouldn’t just move to the same junior high as me and I felt a loss… would I ever see them again. It didn’t occur to me that wouldn’t be a thing. Made some new friends in junior high with kids bused from different neighborhoods and at the end of junior high they also then went somewhere else. This seemed like poor planning… that was my 9th grade thought.
By the time I got to high school I was a slight minority at my school. I’d guess about 40pct white. Busing was still happening but the areas that pulled into my high school were already more desegregated than my earlier schools. I don’t remember there being a lot of angst between students of different races. Some students hung in all white or all black crowds but there was plenty of mixing. Our student council president was black as were other members of that committee and we all got along well.
My husband was bused out of his community in the same county different neighborhood. He remembers having both white and black teachers and making black friends and other than some families leaving public education for catholic schools doesn’t remember a lot of push back. He did however experience more fighting and anger amongst the student body the schools he was sent to and he said the long bus rides and lack of feeling that they belonged where they were schooled were pretty general feelings among his neighborhood peers.
Busing went on for absolute decades in that county… easily until the 90s when by that time so many of the neighborhoods in the county were already desegregated but they kept busing kids. By the time we had kids we hated the idea of them spending long times on buses to be at school outside of their community.
I always wondered what were the effects of all the black kids removed from their communities. It always seemed so devastating to my younger self. I don’t know because all the kids I knew who had been bused in from 3-9th grade I never saw again.
There were disappointments in high school. AP courses disappeared every year and replaced by more remedial classes… and foreign languages taught went from 7 down to 3. I definitely felt I didn’t get a good high school education. I left school half day in 12th grade because all the APs I would have taken weren’t available and I had to pay my way to college
Myself and I knew leaving to work half day would serve me better.
From the book the idea that community schools would serve kids in their own communities but build in protections for poor communities by also providing meals and health and tutoring seems less jarring than busing kids. But then also I can’t imagine my education having been in all white populations. I think I would have definitely been poorly served by not knowing and learning with a diverse community of people and races.
It is heartbreaking to hear some of what the authors son experienced. Anger inducing. Frustrating. Educating everyone well and fairly regardless of race and background and income should be a no brainer as a goal of decency and good. We are so far from that mindset and slipping even further under the current regime. I can only hope that pockets of people are still fighting and discovering and coming up with educational ideas that can bring everyone up to the highest education standard possible but man is it exhausting to think of the continual and constant fight to bring that about.
June 15, 2025
I had so many emotions while reading this book that not only pained me, but so too awoken old wounds that I never even knew I had. As someone who grew up in an urban environment, with a single mom, and am now a younger millennial who has just recently crossed over into the first year of my 30’s, I too have achieved that goal of which at once was fleeting—that of a college education mind you, over the course of six years rather than four due to finances. But even this thought—the idea of being the first in my family to graduate from a four year institution (even with an older brother), was something that I was told to be proud of. And I was.
But as I’ve read this book, and as I’ve reflected on my life lately, as an introvert with too much time on my hands, i have went back to so many moments at different times during my education upbringing, and I have realized, how cheated I feel sometimes. I was introduced to “gifted classes” in fourth grade, that of math. In fifth grade, I was somehow not recommended to it anymore (and the reason never explained). From grades 3-5, I won an award that was some type of state award for academic excellence that convened all “African Americans” (I don’t know why I quoted that), but yes we were all invited to a gathering once a year, usually in the summer to be presented an award. Once again, a proud moment in my psyche. But I had no true understanding of why, I was getting these awards. I didn’t think I was particularly smart. And my last example, comes when I was leaving elementary school, to enter middle school (grades 6-8), and my biggest champion from my elementary school had recommended going to a “charter school”. I didn’t know what that was. I just knew that all my friends weren’t going there, and I wanted to be near all my friends.
Suffice to say, that decision is one that fills me with much regret even to. As I moved forward in life and into middle school, we chose our own classes, and once again, I absconded from now what was understood as “Honors classes”. No good reason, save for an imposter syndrome that was manifesting itself deep inside of me, before I even knew that it had a name. And this would follow me through high school, until the 10th grade, where I finally said enough was enough, and took an honors English class, and an AP psychology class.
What Noliwe Rooks gets right in this book, in my opinion, is everything. I grew up in an integrated school, but lived in a very minority-based environment. I had no mentors. And I had many feelings of inferiority, until I received my first college acceptance. That even being said, I was ill-prepared for college, looking back. As much as I tried, there were gaps in my knowledge, due to invisible factors nobody could truly ever understand and I just had to deal with it.
But as I read this book, and started to put names to concepts, and truly reflect on specific moments throughout my education, in which something may have happened, that I was ashamed of— my first example being in the back of the bus on my way home from school being asked for the first time by friends: “why do you talk white”?—that moment introduced a vulnerability and new insecurity that I had no response to. It was the type of teasing that was subtle at first, but then the pile-on occurred, and left me shamed.
As someone who avoided the honors classes early on, much of my friends were black. But then in that singular moment, I wondered if at all, these folks were actually my friends, and how come I didn’t have no “true white friends”.
So thank you Ms Rooks. I will leave with this quote, one of many that I highlighted:
A product of Chicago's system herself, Hansberry told the crowd that her experience with America's racially segregated, overcrowded schools in the 1960s taught her what it felt like to be educated by disinterested teachers in overcrowded classrooms, not to be respected and loved. Despite tests showing she was considered gifted, "To this day, I do not add, subtract, or multiply with ease.... This is what we mean when we speak of the scars, the marks that the ghettoized child carries through life.... To be imprisoned in the ghetto is at best to be forgotten, or at most to be deliberately cheated out of one's birthright." (150-151)
But as I’ve read this book, and as I’ve reflected on my life lately, as an introvert with too much time on my hands, i have went back to so many moments at different times during my education upbringing, and I have realized, how cheated I feel sometimes. I was introduced to “gifted classes” in fourth grade, that of math. In fifth grade, I was somehow not recommended to it anymore (and the reason never explained). From grades 3-5, I won an award that was some type of state award for academic excellence that convened all “African Americans” (I don’t know why I quoted that), but yes we were all invited to a gathering once a year, usually in the summer to be presented an award. Once again, a proud moment in my psyche. But I had no true understanding of why, I was getting these awards. I didn’t think I was particularly smart. And my last example, comes when I was leaving elementary school, to enter middle school (grades 6-8), and my biggest champion from my elementary school had recommended going to a “charter school”. I didn’t know what that was. I just knew that all my friends weren’t going there, and I wanted to be near all my friends.
Suffice to say, that decision is one that fills me with much regret even to. As I moved forward in life and into middle school, we chose our own classes, and once again, I absconded from now what was understood as “Honors classes”. No good reason, save for an imposter syndrome that was manifesting itself deep inside of me, before I even knew that it had a name. And this would follow me through high school, until the 10th grade, where I finally said enough was enough, and took an honors English class, and an AP psychology class.
What Noliwe Rooks gets right in this book, in my opinion, is everything. I grew up in an integrated school, but lived in a very minority-based environment. I had no mentors. And I had many feelings of inferiority, until I received my first college acceptance. That even being said, I was ill-prepared for college, looking back. As much as I tried, there were gaps in my knowledge, due to invisible factors nobody could truly ever understand and I just had to deal with it.
But as I read this book, and started to put names to concepts, and truly reflect on specific moments throughout my education, in which something may have happened, that I was ashamed of— my first example being in the back of the bus on my way home from school being asked for the first time by friends: “why do you talk white”?—that moment introduced a vulnerability and new insecurity that I had no response to. It was the type of teasing that was subtle at first, but then the pile-on occurred, and left me shamed.
As someone who avoided the honors classes early on, much of my friends were black. But then in that singular moment, I wondered if at all, these folks were actually my friends, and how come I didn’t have no “true white friends”.
So thank you Ms Rooks. I will leave with this quote, one of many that I highlighted:
A product of Chicago's system herself, Hansberry told the crowd that her experience with America's racially segregated, overcrowded schools in the 1960s taught her what it felt like to be educated by disinterested teachers in overcrowded classrooms, not to be respected and loved. Despite tests showing she was considered gifted, "To this day, I do not add, subtract, or multiply with ease.... This is what we mean when we speak of the scars, the marks that the ghettoized child carries through life.... To be imprisoned in the ghetto is at best to be forgotten, or at most to be deliberately cheated out of one's birthright." (150-151)
April 25, 2025
Let me start by talking about what I liked about this book. I appreciated the in depth history of desegregating schools. The author did a great job of going into more depth about school desegregation than the highlighted news reels that we have all come to associate with the topic. I enjoyed reading the author’s stories of her families’ history with school desegregation. Her grandparents sound like they were amazing and I identified with their passion for wanting to spread the love of education and uplift the children in their community.
Here’s what I disliked about this book. First off it seemed wildly disorganized to me. I really couldn’t figure out the exact point that the author was trying to make throughout the text. One minute she was talking about how schools never really desegregated and that was the real culprit to why black children don’t succeed. The next minute she is stating the black children need to be surrounded by their community and taught by black teachers and principals because only then can their emotional and societal needs be met and foster. Then she followed all that up with a story about how her son’s black principal chose the side of the white students during an incident at the school.
I picked this book up because I like to read books about the education system and ways to make it better for all students, because I think the system itself is inherently broken. Now, I personally think it is the class system (that most people don’t recognize we have in this country and instead it is labeled as a race system) that is to blame for the poor public education that our children are receiving. The author is a university professor of African studies and so I think naturally she sees and thinks that everyone see things through the lens of race or more specifically that everything is a result of racism against black people. This became apparent to me as throughout the book her editor and she proceeded to capitalize the b in black but not the w for white or the b for brown when describing the race of people. However I think that although she won’t directly voice that our problems are class related not race related, she too can now see the discrepancies in our education system are in face class related issues. I base this on her inclusion of the following passage which she ended the book with:
“ The complete story of education in the United States is operatic in its dramatic highs and lows. The peaks and valleys rise and fall in three distinct register is a song of white skin and life-altering access to power and privilege. The lower register is the reality of too little money invested in the people, schools, neighborhoods, and communities where Black, brown, and poor children live. It is a story of citizenship distorted and the sticky reality of caste from which learning alone cannot free children. The third register wraps itself around the first two. It is the sometimes transformative sometimes emotionally devastating tune of many Black, brown and poor children who desegregate predominantly white and wealthy schools.”
If we take out the black, brown, and white from that text we are simply left with wealthy and poor. Maybe if we can finally focus on that we might actually start addressing the real problems with the education system in our country.
Here’s what I disliked about this book. First off it seemed wildly disorganized to me. I really couldn’t figure out the exact point that the author was trying to make throughout the text. One minute she was talking about how schools never really desegregated and that was the real culprit to why black children don’t succeed. The next minute she is stating the black children need to be surrounded by their community and taught by black teachers and principals because only then can their emotional and societal needs be met and foster. Then she followed all that up with a story about how her son’s black principal chose the side of the white students during an incident at the school.
I picked this book up because I like to read books about the education system and ways to make it better for all students, because I think the system itself is inherently broken. Now, I personally think it is the class system (that most people don’t recognize we have in this country and instead it is labeled as a race system) that is to blame for the poor public education that our children are receiving. The author is a university professor of African studies and so I think naturally she sees and thinks that everyone see things through the lens of race or more specifically that everything is a result of racism against black people. This became apparent to me as throughout the book her editor and she proceeded to capitalize the b in black but not the w for white or the b for brown when describing the race of people. However I think that although she won’t directly voice that our problems are class related not race related, she too can now see the discrepancies in our education system are in face class related issues. I base this on her inclusion of the following passage which she ended the book with:
“ The complete story of education in the United States is operatic in its dramatic highs and lows. The peaks and valleys rise and fall in three distinct register is a song of white skin and life-altering access to power and privilege. The lower register is the reality of too little money invested in the people, schools, neighborhoods, and communities where Black, brown, and poor children live. It is a story of citizenship distorted and the sticky reality of caste from which learning alone cannot free children. The third register wraps itself around the first two. It is the sometimes transformative sometimes emotionally devastating tune of many Black, brown and poor children who desegregate predominantly white and wealthy schools.”
If we take out the black, brown, and white from that text we are simply left with wealthy and poor. Maybe if we can finally focus on that we might actually start addressing the real problems with the education system in our country.
February 23, 2026
Foremost, if you are going to audiobook this make sure it is the version read by the author herself. She is so fantastic to listen to and it is rare to be able to hear something read by the author themself. Especially given the personal experiences which she touches on, the experiences of her parents as well as her son, would feel wrong being read by someone else.
Coming across books like these is one of the reasons I adore a goodreads challenge. I have set myself a mission to read more varied non-fiction this year and expand my knowledge outside of my studies. This is a perfect book for that. Particularly the analysis of Board v Brown, which I thought I understood well, was an incredible new perspective. Placing into light not just the reasonings of the court but also all the misery that went into even getting the case before those judges and all the negative knock on effects of such a decision.
What sticks with me from this book is just how disconnected I truly am from the reality of institutionalised racism within the US. Not to say that western Europe does not experience serious issues with discrimination and institutional racism, but the degree to which it lies in the very fabric of American life is unfathomable to me. I completely see how a Danish researcher, no matter the fact that he has a Noble Prize in Economics, would think that the public just didn't know they were racist. All you need is to tell them what they are doing is wrong and they will change their behaviour... which obviously did not work.
What I so appreciate is that the author takes the difficult step of not just criticising the existing system, which is where plenty would stop. But goes so far as to suggest a solution, community schools which are more than places of learning but also support the people who live there. To centre these places on more than an education, but also a place to improve sex ed, health education, mental health, access to food and establish community ties. This can play such a big role not just in improving educational outcomes, but also push back against statistics which demonstrate both higher rates of being a perpetrator as well as a victim of crime.
What limits this book to 4 stars for me is the lack of engagement with the decision against Affirmative Action. She mentions it once at the very end, but then fails to engage with the fact that what this really signified was a shift where it is no longer white students against POC students. But we are actually witnessing a fragmentation off all ethnicities akin to what was seen in California amongst Chinese American communities. The author talks about this explicitly in the earlier chapters of the book, but she doesn't come back to it. Maybe this is the result of the book's scope, not wanting to detract from the stories of black experiences. Nonetheless, I find its exclusion makes the book feel less complete.
Coming across books like these is one of the reasons I adore a goodreads challenge. I have set myself a mission to read more varied non-fiction this year and expand my knowledge outside of my studies. This is a perfect book for that. Particularly the analysis of Board v Brown, which I thought I understood well, was an incredible new perspective. Placing into light not just the reasonings of the court but also all the misery that went into even getting the case before those judges and all the negative knock on effects of such a decision.
What sticks with me from this book is just how disconnected I truly am from the reality of institutionalised racism within the US. Not to say that western Europe does not experience serious issues with discrimination and institutional racism, but the degree to which it lies in the very fabric of American life is unfathomable to me. I completely see how a Danish researcher, no matter the fact that he has a Noble Prize in Economics, would think that the public just didn't know they were racist. All you need is to tell them what they are doing is wrong and they will change their behaviour... which obviously did not work.
What I so appreciate is that the author takes the difficult step of not just criticising the existing system, which is where plenty would stop. But goes so far as to suggest a solution, community schools which are more than places of learning but also support the people who live there. To centre these places on more than an education, but also a place to improve sex ed, health education, mental health, access to food and establish community ties. This can play such a big role not just in improving educational outcomes, but also push back against statistics which demonstrate both higher rates of being a perpetrator as well as a victim of crime.
What limits this book to 4 stars for me is the lack of engagement with the decision against Affirmative Action. She mentions it once at the very end, but then fails to engage with the fact that what this really signified was a shift where it is no longer white students against POC students. But we are actually witnessing a fragmentation off all ethnicities akin to what was seen in California amongst Chinese American communities. The author talks about this explicitly in the earlier chapters of the book, but she doesn't come back to it. Maybe this is the result of the book's scope, not wanting to detract from the stories of black experiences. Nonetheless, I find its exclusion makes the book feel less complete.
May 1, 2025
📱 Thank you to NetGalley for an e-book ARC. This book was extremely thought-provoking. The history I was taught was that Brown v Board of Education was a net positive to finally achieve desegregated schools in the U.S. However, now that it’s been 60 years, we can see that we neither accomplished desegregation nor did we accomplish better education for black children. In some school districts, schools are just as segregated today as they were in the 1960’s and 70’s.
The author does an excellent job weaving stories of her grandparents who were teachers pre-Brown as well as her own stories being the only black child to desegregate her schools, followed by her son‘s experience in white only schools and the bias and discrimination he was the recipient of.
The aha moment for me in reading this book was when the author talked about the experience of her father being educated in black-only schools taught by black teachers who believed in him. Contrast that to when he went to an all-white law school in California and he dropped out due to the culture shock and the biases his white teachers held.
Pre-Brown, black schools were central to black power and building black children up. They were often the center for social justice movements. Post-Brown, all of the black teachers permanently lost their jobs (because the white parents of integrated schools refused to have their white children taught by black teachers) and the cornerstones of the black community were dismantled along with it.
I had never considered what was lost in the way America integrated its schools. I never considered the extreme downside to going from black teachers who build you up to white teachers who refuse to believe you’re just as capable as the white children in their classrooms.
What’s worse, we didn’t even achieve integration! Because once the inner city schools started desegregating, white flight kicked in and white families moved to the suburbs. Our schools have never achieved true integration nor true equality. And in some ways, children have it worse now than in the days pre-Brown. That’s at least the perspective the author provides. We have all collectively failed the majority of black children and only the select few actually benefit from our schools in a post-Brown world.
“One truth that is perhaps simple, perhaps not, is that the integration of schools in the United States made racial progress and economic opportunity possible for a relative few Black people, while making it much, much, more difficult for many to achieve.”
“The dream of a taxpayer-supported public school system available to all became a tale of two systems: an underfunded public system mostly attended by black students and another made up of public and newly opened private schools set up for and populated by white children.”
The author does an excellent job weaving stories of her grandparents who were teachers pre-Brown as well as her own stories being the only black child to desegregate her schools, followed by her son‘s experience in white only schools and the bias and discrimination he was the recipient of.
The aha moment for me in reading this book was when the author talked about the experience of her father being educated in black-only schools taught by black teachers who believed in him. Contrast that to when he went to an all-white law school in California and he dropped out due to the culture shock and the biases his white teachers held.
Pre-Brown, black schools were central to black power and building black children up. They were often the center for social justice movements. Post-Brown, all of the black teachers permanently lost their jobs (because the white parents of integrated schools refused to have their white children taught by black teachers) and the cornerstones of the black community were dismantled along with it.
I had never considered what was lost in the way America integrated its schools. I never considered the extreme downside to going from black teachers who build you up to white teachers who refuse to believe you’re just as capable as the white children in their classrooms.
What’s worse, we didn’t even achieve integration! Because once the inner city schools started desegregating, white flight kicked in and white families moved to the suburbs. Our schools have never achieved true integration nor true equality. And in some ways, children have it worse now than in the days pre-Brown. That’s at least the perspective the author provides. We have all collectively failed the majority of black children and only the select few actually benefit from our schools in a post-Brown world.
“One truth that is perhaps simple, perhaps not, is that the integration of schools in the United States made racial progress and economic opportunity possible for a relative few Black people, while making it much, much, more difficult for many to achieve.”
“The dream of a taxpayer-supported public school system available to all became a tale of two systems: an underfunded public system mostly attended by black students and another made up of public and newly opened private schools set up for and populated by white children.”
March 8, 2026
History is never still. It sits in classrooms, whispers in textbooks, hides in family stories, and shadows the daily routines of students who cross thresholds into buildings meant to educate but also to discipline, to uplift but also to sort. Noliwe Rooks’s Integrated refuses the tidy narrative we were taught to memorize. It does not accept Brown v. Board of Education as the unequivocal dawn of a better day. Instead, it asks what was sacrificed, who was silenced, and how communities once rich in their own educational institutions were undone in the name of progress.
To read this book is to encounter a difficult accounting. It begins in the celebratory register of May 17, 1954, with judges in black robes proclaiming the end of “separate but equal.” Yet almost immediately the texture thickens, the promises unravel. Rooks documents the closures of Black schools, the dismissals of thousands of Black teachers, the unraveling of a professional class that had anchored communities. She shows how schoolhouses were bombed, how classrooms were desecrated, how the very structures that once held generations of Black students were burned to the ground. And she does this not as a detached historian, but as the descendant of educators, activists, and children who lived through those changes. Her family is woven into the argument like a thread that ties theory to blood.
One of the great strengths of Integrated is how it marries rigor with intimacy. Rooks cites legal opinions, court transcripts, and sociological studies with the discipline of a scholar who knows the archives inside and out. But she also returns to her father’s experiences, her grandmother’s classrooms, her son’s present-day encounters with tracking and subtle exclusion. The reader cannot mistake the stakes: this is not abstract. It is generational. It is embodied. It is the record of what happens when policies are made at the level of principle but lived at the level of neighborhood.
Consider the story of Detroit, where literacy became not only a constitutional question but a battlefield. Rooks shows us activists like Helen Moore, fighting to demand that children had not only the right to a seat in a building but the right to read, to imagine futures. She pulls us into lawsuits, emergency manager laws, and the indignities of neglected infrastructure. The detail is harrowing, but the pattern is clear: integration without investment produced abandonment, not equity.
Or look at San Francisco’s Potrero Hill, where “integration” meant placing students into hostile environments without support, where the language of opportunity cloaked realities of surveillance and criminalization. Rooks names the schools, the principals, the neighborhood organizations, even the television shows that told children what they were worth. She does not flinch from recounting the moments when white resistance turned violent, or when policies coded as neutral entrenched division.
The chapter on Black teachers is perhaps the beating heart of the book. We learn how thousands lost their jobs after Brown, how communities lost role models and advocates, how the absence of same-race teachers rippled into lowered expectations and diminished opportunities for Black children. Rooks pulls from oral histories, newspaper accounts, and the scholarship of others to demonstrate that integration did not mean equality; it meant displacement. Here the book is devastating in its clarity: the victory of access came at the price of institutional loss.
Rooks also insists on drawing connections to health, to poverty, to the everyday environments in which children grow. She notes that structural racism is not only educational but medical, environmental, psychological. Noise pollution, segregated housing, unequal healthcare—all of these shape the learning lives of children. This holistic approach makes Integrated more than an education history; it is a cultural history of how America defines worth and opportunity.
And yet, the book is not only an autopsy of failed promises. It is also a search for possibility. Community schools, Rooks argues, offer a model rooted in accountability and collaboration. She highlights the work of the Black Panther Party’s Oakland Community School, the vision of Mary McLeod Bethune, and the more recent efforts like LeBron James’s I Promise School. These examples are fragile, contested, sometimes uneven in results, but they point toward a different paradigm: schools as community anchors, places where parents, teachers, and children are bound together in shared responsibility.
The writing itself demands attention. Rooks’s sentences often carry the rhythm of oratory, with repetition and emphasis that recall both sermon and speech. She shifts between historical narration and personal recollection without breaking stride. The effect is cumulative: by the time you finish, you are not only persuaded by the data but also moved by the insistence of memory.
Still, there are limits. Some readers will wish for a more sustained exploration of integration’s successes—moments when children did flourish across racial lines, when resources truly did expand. Others may want a more detailed roadmap of how to scale community-based models, how to resist the forces of privatization and segrenomics that Rooks has charted in earlier work. These gaps do not undermine the achievement, but they do leave the reader hungry for more practical scaffolding.
What Integrated achieves, however, is a reframing so powerful that it cannot be ignored. It asks us to reconsider one of the central myths of American progress and to see instead the costs that myth has hidden. It insists that we remember the teachers who lost their posts, the children who faced violence in unfamiliar schools, the communities that were told their institutions were inferior when in fact they had been lifelines. It shows how policy, however well-intentioned, can wound when it does not listen to those it purports to serve.
The book resonates because it is honest. It does not claim that segregation was preferable. It does not argue for nostalgia. Instead, it presses us to ask: integration at what cost, and for whom? What might have been achieved if investment had flowed into Black schools rather than away from them? What models can we imagine now that honor community knowledge rather than erase it? These are questions that will not fade with time.
In my reception, the book earns a rating of 90 out of 100.
That number is less important than the weight of what remains after the final page: the images of lost schools, the voices of silenced teachers, the resilience of families still fighting for dignity in education. Rooks has given us a work that is both archive and testimony, both critique and elegy. It belongs not only on the shelves of scholars of education and history, but in the hands of parents, teachers, and policymakers who must confront the unfinished business of equality.
To read Integrated is to sit in a classroom where the walls hold memory, where the chalkboards bear names of the forgotten, where every lesson is an invitation to see clearly. It is sobering, unflinching, and necessary. And it ensures that when we talk about education as the path to freedom, we do so with eyes wide open.
To read this book is to encounter a difficult accounting. It begins in the celebratory register of May 17, 1954, with judges in black robes proclaiming the end of “separate but equal.” Yet almost immediately the texture thickens, the promises unravel. Rooks documents the closures of Black schools, the dismissals of thousands of Black teachers, the unraveling of a professional class that had anchored communities. She shows how schoolhouses were bombed, how classrooms were desecrated, how the very structures that once held generations of Black students were burned to the ground. And she does this not as a detached historian, but as the descendant of educators, activists, and children who lived through those changes. Her family is woven into the argument like a thread that ties theory to blood.
One of the great strengths of Integrated is how it marries rigor with intimacy. Rooks cites legal opinions, court transcripts, and sociological studies with the discipline of a scholar who knows the archives inside and out. But she also returns to her father’s experiences, her grandmother’s classrooms, her son’s present-day encounters with tracking and subtle exclusion. The reader cannot mistake the stakes: this is not abstract. It is generational. It is embodied. It is the record of what happens when policies are made at the level of principle but lived at the level of neighborhood.
Consider the story of Detroit, where literacy became not only a constitutional question but a battlefield. Rooks shows us activists like Helen Moore, fighting to demand that children had not only the right to a seat in a building but the right to read, to imagine futures. She pulls us into lawsuits, emergency manager laws, and the indignities of neglected infrastructure. The detail is harrowing, but the pattern is clear: integration without investment produced abandonment, not equity.
Or look at San Francisco’s Potrero Hill, where “integration” meant placing students into hostile environments without support, where the language of opportunity cloaked realities of surveillance and criminalization. Rooks names the schools, the principals, the neighborhood organizations, even the television shows that told children what they were worth. She does not flinch from recounting the moments when white resistance turned violent, or when policies coded as neutral entrenched division.
The chapter on Black teachers is perhaps the beating heart of the book. We learn how thousands lost their jobs after Brown, how communities lost role models and advocates, how the absence of same-race teachers rippled into lowered expectations and diminished opportunities for Black children. Rooks pulls from oral histories, newspaper accounts, and the scholarship of others to demonstrate that integration did not mean equality; it meant displacement. Here the book is devastating in its clarity: the victory of access came at the price of institutional loss.
Rooks also insists on drawing connections to health, to poverty, to the everyday environments in which children grow. She notes that structural racism is not only educational but medical, environmental, psychological. Noise pollution, segregated housing, unequal healthcare—all of these shape the learning lives of children. This holistic approach makes Integrated more than an education history; it is a cultural history of how America defines worth and opportunity.
And yet, the book is not only an autopsy of failed promises. It is also a search for possibility. Community schools, Rooks argues, offer a model rooted in accountability and collaboration. She highlights the work of the Black Panther Party’s Oakland Community School, the vision of Mary McLeod Bethune, and the more recent efforts like LeBron James’s I Promise School. These examples are fragile, contested, sometimes uneven in results, but they point toward a different paradigm: schools as community anchors, places where parents, teachers, and children are bound together in shared responsibility.
The writing itself demands attention. Rooks’s sentences often carry the rhythm of oratory, with repetition and emphasis that recall both sermon and speech. She shifts between historical narration and personal recollection without breaking stride. The effect is cumulative: by the time you finish, you are not only persuaded by the data but also moved by the insistence of memory.
Still, there are limits. Some readers will wish for a more sustained exploration of integration’s successes—moments when children did flourish across racial lines, when resources truly did expand. Others may want a more detailed roadmap of how to scale community-based models, how to resist the forces of privatization and segrenomics that Rooks has charted in earlier work. These gaps do not undermine the achievement, but they do leave the reader hungry for more practical scaffolding.
What Integrated achieves, however, is a reframing so powerful that it cannot be ignored. It asks us to reconsider one of the central myths of American progress and to see instead the costs that myth has hidden. It insists that we remember the teachers who lost their posts, the children who faced violence in unfamiliar schools, the communities that were told their institutions were inferior when in fact they had been lifelines. It shows how policy, however well-intentioned, can wound when it does not listen to those it purports to serve.
The book resonates because it is honest. It does not claim that segregation was preferable. It does not argue for nostalgia. Instead, it presses us to ask: integration at what cost, and for whom? What might have been achieved if investment had flowed into Black schools rather than away from them? What models can we imagine now that honor community knowledge rather than erase it? These are questions that will not fade with time.
In my reception, the book earns a rating of 90 out of 100.
That number is less important than the weight of what remains after the final page: the images of lost schools, the voices of silenced teachers, the resilience of families still fighting for dignity in education. Rooks has given us a work that is both archive and testimony, both critique and elegy. It belongs not only on the shelves of scholars of education and history, but in the hands of parents, teachers, and policymakers who must confront the unfinished business of equality.
To read Integrated is to sit in a classroom where the walls hold memory, where the chalkboards bear names of the forgotten, where every lesson is an invitation to see clearly. It is sobering, unflinching, and necessary. And it ensures that when we talk about education as the path to freedom, we do so with eyes wide open.
May 7, 2025
There's good material here, but it didn't come together for me as a unified book. More like notes for about 5 quite different journal articles on....
--history of school desegregation [probably the strongest piece incl. detailed analysis of white flight, segregation academies, violence in reaction to busing......]
--her parents' and grandparents' experiences with and fond memories at all-Black schools (if you read some of the older Wx Post columnists who are nostalgic for their days at Dunbar HS in DC you'll know this story) with poor resources but strong community support and demanding teachers
--her own less positive experiences as one of the few Black kids placed in gifted/talented classes at newly integrated schools in California
--her maddening experience overseeing her son's K-12 education in Princeton when she was on faculty there
--her very brief, failed effort to help turn around urban schools in Trenton with an army of Princeton students she ends up castigating as racist would-be white saviors
And ending with a very brief look at "community schools" including the one LeBron James started in Akron as possible solution to achievement gaps.
Each time the focus shifted I was left wishing for more of a deep dive. Like there's a negative take in passing on Teach for America and such, but no real in-depth view of the research on those programs, what was lacking or not scalable or what worked great and just needs to be funded better, and so on.
Obviously, your mileage may vary as a function of interests. For me, I could have done without most of the history and ancestor recaps (e.g., her Dad's work hosting a pre-Sesame Street show for Black pre-schoolers) in favor of more depth on the contemporary scene, but others may prefer the opposite of course.
--history of school desegregation [probably the strongest piece incl. detailed analysis of white flight, segregation academies, violence in reaction to busing......]
--her parents' and grandparents' experiences with and fond memories at all-Black schools (if you read some of the older Wx Post columnists who are nostalgic for their days at Dunbar HS in DC you'll know this story) with poor resources but strong community support and demanding teachers
--her own less positive experiences as one of the few Black kids placed in gifted/talented classes at newly integrated schools in California
--her maddening experience overseeing her son's K-12 education in Princeton when she was on faculty there
--her very brief, failed effort to help turn around urban schools in Trenton with an army of Princeton students she ends up castigating as racist would-be white saviors
And ending with a very brief look at "community schools" including the one LeBron James started in Akron as possible solution to achievement gaps.
Each time the focus shifted I was left wishing for more of a deep dive. Like there's a negative take in passing on Teach for America and such, but no real in-depth view of the research on those programs, what was lacking or not scalable or what worked great and just needs to be funded better, and so on.
Obviously, your mileage may vary as a function of interests. For me, I could have done without most of the history and ancestor recaps (e.g., her Dad's work hosting a pre-Sesame Street show for Black pre-schoolers) in favor of more depth on the contemporary scene, but others may prefer the opposite of course.
May 8, 2025
Well this is the kind of book that not every reader is going to be ready for, but more people need to read. We (generally speaking I mean well-meaning white middle class liberals) take it for granted that the landmark Brown v Board of Education decision, ruling for desegregation of public schools, was a good thing. That obviously, there were still problems with public education, and barricades (figurative and literal) for black students getting an equal education, but that integration was the best way forward.
And this book shows many examples of how that may not be the case. That actually, integrating black and white students in public schools in the 50s and 60s actively harmed some black students, black families, black teachers, black schools, and black communities. The author covers basically her own family over four generations showing how everyone experienced education and what the different time periods were like, with challenges in each.
I was not surprised by a lot of the examples given in the book; white Americans have gone to great lengths time and time again to continue to uphold racist systems in all segments of society. But I was not aware of the vibrant black community schools that had been thriving before Brown v Board. And the subsequent dismantling of those schools, disruptions to the social fabric those schools provided, and the number of black teachers who had to leave the profession because they would not be hired at public schools. You add in the turmoil over school busing and forced integration to try and truly integrate entire areas, and it really is just a mess.
- Educational, economic, and emotional damage done to black children.
- author encourages looking for "another way" and gives examples of Oakland community schools that get buy-in from all families in order to be successful
Thank you to PRHAudio for the gifted audiobook.
And this book shows many examples of how that may not be the case. That actually, integrating black and white students in public schools in the 50s and 60s actively harmed some black students, black families, black teachers, black schools, and black communities. The author covers basically her own family over four generations showing how everyone experienced education and what the different time periods were like, with challenges in each.
I was not surprised by a lot of the examples given in the book; white Americans have gone to great lengths time and time again to continue to uphold racist systems in all segments of society. But I was not aware of the vibrant black community schools that had been thriving before Brown v Board. And the subsequent dismantling of those schools, disruptions to the social fabric those schools provided, and the number of black teachers who had to leave the profession because they would not be hired at public schools. You add in the turmoil over school busing and forced integration to try and truly integrate entire areas, and it really is just a mess.
- Educational, economic, and emotional damage done to black children.
- author encourages looking for "another way" and gives examples of Oakland community schools that get buy-in from all families in order to be successful
Thank you to PRHAudio for the gifted audiobook.
February 7, 2026
Rating: 4 stars
Integrated is a challenging and important read that made me rethink what I thought I knew about school desegregation in the United States. Rather than treating Brown v. Board of Education as an unquestioned success, Noliwe Rooks examines what was lost in the process, especially for Black students, teachers, and communities. The book offers a deeper historical perspective than is usually taught, particularly when it comes to how the North avoided meaningful desegregation while claiming moral progress.
One of the book’s greatest strengths is how Rooks weaves history with personal and familial experience. Her reflections on Black-only schools before integration, staffed by teachers who believed in and actively supported their students, were especially striking. The argument that integration dismantled many of these institutions, while failing to deliver true equality, is both unsettling and persuasive.
At times, I did struggle with the structure. The shifting timelines and movement across decades occasionally made it harder to maintain a clear sense of progression, and I found myself needing to pause and reorient. A more linear or clearly segmented structure might have made the argument easier to follow, especially for readers new to this history.
Even so, this book succeeds where it matters most. It expands perspective, complicates a familiar narrative, and raises questions that feel deeply relevant today. If the structure had been slightly clearer, this would have been a five-star read for me. As it stands, it’s a strong four stars and well worth reading for anyone interested in education, history, or understanding racial inequity beyond simplified stories of progress.
Integrated is a challenging and important read that made me rethink what I thought I knew about school desegregation in the United States. Rather than treating Brown v. Board of Education as an unquestioned success, Noliwe Rooks examines what was lost in the process, especially for Black students, teachers, and communities. The book offers a deeper historical perspective than is usually taught, particularly when it comes to how the North avoided meaningful desegregation while claiming moral progress.
One of the book’s greatest strengths is how Rooks weaves history with personal and familial experience. Her reflections on Black-only schools before integration, staffed by teachers who believed in and actively supported their students, were especially striking. The argument that integration dismantled many of these institutions, while failing to deliver true equality, is both unsettling and persuasive.
At times, I did struggle with the structure. The shifting timelines and movement across decades occasionally made it harder to maintain a clear sense of progression, and I found myself needing to pause and reorient. A more linear or clearly segmented structure might have made the argument easier to follow, especially for readers new to this history.
Even so, this book succeeds where it matters most. It expands perspective, complicates a familiar narrative, and raises questions that feel deeply relevant today. If the structure had been slightly clearer, this would have been a five-star read for me. As it stands, it’s a strong four stars and well worth reading for anyone interested in education, history, or understanding racial inequity beyond simplified stories of progress.
May 9, 2025
If somone had told me prior to reading this book that black children do better in schools with teachers that look like them and can relate to them, culturally, I would have wholeheartedly agreed. Yet, somehow, it never occured to me until reading this book how Brown vs The Board of Education could have been harmful to black children, since it was primarily accomplished by attempting to place black children in white schools (beyond the obvious Ruby Bridges type stories). This book is absolutely worth the read due to how well it corrected this misuderstanding. 3.5 stars rounded up because I wanted a deeper dive in the last chapter about community schools and whether separate but actually equal schools are truly the answer- the author proposes community schools as a solution due to attempted correction for outside factors that affect poor Black students, but then laments how easily the outside factors can overwhem the solutions of community school. Likewise, she uses Lebron James's school as an example of an effective community school, but only because Jame's foundation provides the extra funding allowing for increased resources and smaller class size. This was a very engaging read- I appreciated how stories about the author's personal and family member's experiences highlight the premise of the book. Thank you to NetGalley and Pantheon Books for the opportunity to review this.
February 2, 2026
1.5
I didn't like her other book so I have thoughts on our lesser Lisa Delpit (who I also had problems with)
Informative but the writing was a bit too ‘pop’ for my taste the short book doesn’t really say anything new or provide realistic tangible solutions to the struggles of Black children in a racist school system. I hate this never ending torture of authors infusing their persona backstories into nonfiction regardless of its relevance. Just write a genre bending memoir so I can knowingly choose not to read it.
Also I continue to massively side eye Black parents who knowingly subject their Black children to racist white environments for their own egos. I wish a school principal would try to make my child apologize for defending himself against racism. Why do we do this?
I also hate when authors say “Black and brown” when they really mean Black. And while she touches on the role of Asian immigrants and their descendants upholding school segregation, she absolutely could have discussed the how “brown” students also perpetuated anti-Blackness in schools and against Black classmates and students.
I think the book is too short and too lacking in serious analysis to truly capture the nuances and complexity of how Black students are abandoned by the school system.
I would recommend Jim Crow’s Pink Slip and Other People’s Children as alternatives or companion to this book.
I didn't like her other book so I have thoughts on our lesser Lisa Delpit (who I also had problems with)
Informative but the writing was a bit too ‘pop’ for my taste the short book doesn’t really say anything new or provide realistic tangible solutions to the struggles of Black children in a racist school system. I hate this never ending torture of authors infusing their persona backstories into nonfiction regardless of its relevance. Just write a genre bending memoir so I can knowingly choose not to read it.
Also I continue to massively side eye Black parents who knowingly subject their Black children to racist white environments for their own egos. I wish a school principal would try to make my child apologize for defending himself against racism. Why do we do this?
I also hate when authors say “Black and brown” when they really mean Black. And while she touches on the role of Asian immigrants and their descendants upholding school segregation, she absolutely could have discussed the how “brown” students also perpetuated anti-Blackness in schools and against Black classmates and students.
I think the book is too short and too lacking in serious analysis to truly capture the nuances and complexity of how Black students are abandoned by the school system.
I would recommend Jim Crow’s Pink Slip and Other People’s Children as alternatives or companion to this book.
June 28, 2025
This book looks at the systemic problem that America has in educating its black children through the eyes of one family - the author's father, himself, and his son. He talks about how prior to Brown v Board, black people didn't really want to integrate because they didn't want to force their children into situations like the ones they faced after the Brown decision. Instead they wanted to force equal resources into their schools. The NAACP, for reasons all their own, ignored what black parents wanted and forced us down the path of integration, which has largely failed. Most schools are still segregated and most mostly black schools are failing. When NCLB specified that a school cannot pass if one racial group at the school is failing more than most students at the school it shone a light on the problem that black children are often sent to remedial classes even if they are gifted, and are seldom put into gifted classes unless the entire school is mostly black. Honestly we're 60-70 years past Brown, you would think we would have fixed some of these problems by now, but apparently not as the author discusses all of the same problems happening with his 13 year old son. This book was much more readable than a critique of the educational system would generally be because it focused most of itself on just three men. So it was interesting, though infuriating.
October 14, 2025
Integrated, written by a black academician child of 1950s teachers, is a post-mortem of school desegregation. Rooks pulls apart what went wrong with the grand idea, and looks closely at the what the black community gave up when they forfeited their "separate but equal" (in theory) school system.
I have such mixed feelings about the failure of inner-city (largely black) schools. It's so easy to blame the black communities (too much crime, no discipline, absenteeism, lack of incentive and parental involvement, etc etc etc). But some of these schools are so terrible! It feels so unfair that an already underprivileged group of people cannot get a decent shot at education, which takes away all hope of them climbing out of the hole they're in.
My husband and I had a heated debate about the education system after I finished the book. At what point is it okay to make decisions that are best for your own child, when they're detrimental to society at large? How much of a responsibility do I have to those kids across the country in urban slums? Do I care that their schools are pathetic as long as my kids get good educational opportunities? These are big questions that our country is largely choosing not to ask right now. We'd rather pretend we live in a post-Civil Rights era where DEI is bad, and white people have it hard.
Anyway, 4 stars.
I have such mixed feelings about the failure of inner-city (largely black) schools. It's so easy to blame the black communities (too much crime, no discipline, absenteeism, lack of incentive and parental involvement, etc etc etc). But some of these schools are so terrible! It feels so unfair that an already underprivileged group of people cannot get a decent shot at education, which takes away all hope of them climbing out of the hole they're in.
My husband and I had a heated debate about the education system after I finished the book. At what point is it okay to make decisions that are best for your own child, when they're detrimental to society at large? How much of a responsibility do I have to those kids across the country in urban slums? Do I care that their schools are pathetic as long as my kids get good educational opportunities? These are big questions that our country is largely choosing not to ask right now. We'd rather pretend we live in a post-Civil Rights era where DEI is bad, and white people have it hard.
Anyway, 4 stars.
July 1, 2025
I was so intrigued with the title of this book being the child of two life long educators, with one being the first to integrate their school at the tender age of a 1st grader. I can recall the stories of my mom being the first Black person in her counties white school here in the upstate of South Carolina (she's still alive and can tell these stories as if they just happened). This book is packed with information that gives facts to the feelings that public schools have continuously failed Black and brown children still to this day in the year of our Lord 2025! This book is very information dense, but I really enjoyed (i use that term loosely) the personal anecdotes of her own experience navigating America's public school system in the 70's and 80's. I can't help but reflect on my experiences in the public school system of South Carolina in the 90's and 00's, but also meditate on the experiences my nieces and nephews face in the American schooling system in the 20's and beyond. I think this is a great book to expand your mind in learning what it takes and what it costs to be educated in America while inhabiting a Black or brown body.
August 8, 2025
Despite the Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954 that was supposed to outlaw segregation in public schools, public school districts all over the country resisted integration. Using data and various stories from Black Americans, author Noliwe Rooks shares a vivid account of the trauma done to Black children. Many Black Americans did not want the Brown decision, and when the decision came down, Black schools were closed, Black teachers found themselves with no jobs, and Black students were exposed to racism by white teachers and students. The goal of this book is to find a way beyond our present systems to make education equitable for children of socioeconomic and ethnic groups in America.
A great read about the history of segregation in America’s public schools. I listened to the audiobook, read by the author. I love that Rooks wove history together with her own family’s experiences in public schools, like her son’s and her own, as well as her experiences as a Black professor at Brown University. I also liked her explanation of what education can look like using the “community approach” that the Black Panthers helped create.
A great read about the history of segregation in America’s public schools. I listened to the audiobook, read by the author. I love that Rooks wove history together with her own family’s experiences in public schools, like her son’s and her own, as well as her experiences as a Black professor at Brown University. I also liked her explanation of what education can look like using the “community approach” that the Black Panthers helped create.
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