The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America

Published in 2005, The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America is a nonfiction book by American author and educator Jonathan Kozol. Drawing on more than 40 years of experience teaching elementary school and advocating for education equality, Kozol describes the almost complete racial isolation of many Black and Hispanic students in American public schools. Although 50 years have passed since the Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision ruled segregated schooling to be unconstitutional, the conditions in many American public schools have remained unchanged. Through conversations with children, teachers, advocates, and policymakers, Kozol explores the impact of segregated education on communities, contemplates the role of public policy in shaping educational opportunities, and questions the moral and ethical dilemmas of segregated schooling.

This guide uses the 2005 Crown e-book edition of the text.

Content Warning: The source text and this guide repeatedly reference racism, inequality, and systemic injustice.

Summary

Kozol begins The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America by describing his experiences as a young teacher in Boston’s segregated schools during the 1960s. The Black students in his elementary school had to contend with many issues, such as dirty, dilapidated facilities, high teacher turnover, and overcrowded classrooms. Although schools have supposedly been desegregated, Kozol goes on to describe how many of these same issues affect Black and Hispanic students today.

Beginning in the Bronx, Kozol explains how many students of color attend “apartheid schools,” which are up to 100% Black and Hispanic. This is sometimes due to neighborhoods with high levels of residential segregation, but even in integrated neighborhoods, white families make a “conscious effort” to “avoid the integration option that is often right at their front door” and instead send their children to more exclusive schools (22). Even though “official culture” continues to honor the Brown v. Board of Education ruling, “official actions” fiercely disavow the decision and continue to promote separate schools for Black and white children.

Many underfunded urban schools with Black and Hispanic majorities use radically different educational pedagogies than suburban schools with a majority-white student body. This includes scripted curricula based on a “model of industrial efficiency” inspired by business management techniques (67). Although many principals justify these curricula by claiming “teacher-proof” materials are necessary to ensure continuity with high turnover rates, many teachers describe the programs as “an intellectual straightjacket.” Furthermore, many of these curricula include “surprisingly explicit training of young children for the modern marketplace” (89), asking children as young as kindergarteners to imagine themselves as “managers” or learn to fill out job applications. Kozol argues that these kinds of programs see inner-city children as “products” and discourage creativity, independence, and critical thinking.

To improve the performance of urban schools, Kozol describes the elaborate accountability and testing regimens many of these schools face. Teachers and principals are under such intense pressure to improve students’ test scores that they sometimes do away with recess and summer break and eliminate “traditional” subjects that aren’t tested on standardized exams. This sometimes results in large gaps in students’ knowledge and removes any sense of joy from learning.

Kozol argues that the division between Black and white students is only widening. He describes exclusive New York City elementary schools that are “disproportionately white enclaves” due to complex entrance requirements. These schools funnel children into exclusive high schools with rigorous college preparation programs. Meanwhile, elementary students in the Bronx usually attend a “large and low-performing high school” where “all their prior years of educational denial are not easily reversed” (142). They must contend with asbestos problems, classes in portable trailers, and even rat infestations. Even students who have college aspirations are often forced into sewing and hairdressing classes in what Kozol calls “a caste-determined practice” that has been pushing children of color into low-paying, menial jobs for decades.

Kozol argues that, in the past decades, there have been many “false promises” to improve urban schools. Some come in the form of policies that plan to raise test scores and graduation rates. Others come in the form of charismatic principals and administrators who promise to turn failing schools around. However, none of these solutions address the root problem of segregation and racial isolation, and none propose integration as a way to improve education for children of color. In fact, some national policies like No Child Left Behind even undermine local attempts to integrate, and various Supreme Court rulings have complicated the fight for educational equality. Many advocates of an improved education system have abandoned the idea of equality altogether and instead fight for children of color to receive an “adequate” education.

Leaders argue that a political movement is needed to draw attention to education inequalities and raise public support. However, Kozol argues that the nation is “morally exhausted” after the upheaval of the Civil Rights Movement, and starting such a movement would prove difficult. The issue of segregated schooling is well hidden from more affluent sectors of society, which are not eager to confront the ethical dilemma of the continued segregation of American public schools.

Despite the many challenges urban schools face, Kozol points out that there are still “treasured places” where teachers and principals resist the pressures of standards and market-driven education practices to create safe learning spaces for children. Teachers who are motivated by a genuine love for children preside over “healthy feeling” classrooms where their students still find some joy in learning. Kozol argues that these schools must “be defended from the unenlightened interventions of the overconfident” (300). He argues that people must remember that desegregation and educational equality are “worth fighting for” (318).