Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois were advocates for the civil rights movement. They offered different strategies for dealing with the problems of poverty and discrimination that black Americans faced during the late 1800s. Their strategies were different. Washington preferred a gradual incline of black involvement and acceptance, whereas DuBois preferred immediate direct action.
However, generally the Northern blacks were somewhat better off than the Southern blacks in 1945. In 1945, African Americans in the North had different conditions then the South. Firstly, there were political differences. Only 15% of black people in the southern states had the right to vote. Black people had the legal right to vote as there were measures that were put into place to prevent the south African Americans from voting by using the poll tax and literacy tests.
Specifically for African Americans, the equality and desegregation under this act of education, the workplace, and voter’s registration has been tremendously empowering. One of the great things about America that many other countries do not have is free education. Under Plessy v. Ferguson, segregation of schools was legalized under the conditions that it was separate but equal. During that time, the schools were definitely separated, but unquestionably unequal. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 overturned Plessy V. Ferguson which not only led to African Americans having better schools, but also allowed them to learn with their Caucasian peers.
Many of these facilities were, education, healthcare, transport, cinemas, restaurants and churches and even housing and estates were segregated. This shows the extent white went to separate them from the ‘inferior’ race. Jim Crow laws limited black Americans from having a better way of life as they were made poorer, didn’t have the opportunity to managerial roles as they were only allowed the low paying jobs and weren’t equal to white people increasing poor conditions, also, led to unequal or no voting rights in coloured communities. Under the Fifteenth Amendment black people had legal rights to vote across America. However, many southern states found ways around the laws to disenfranchise the black populations.
The Achievement Gap: Urban vs. Suburban Schools The public school systems goal in the United States is to provide every child with equal education. Unfortunately somewhere along the lines the education system in our country has failed to provide this equal education to many of our children, especially minority. It isn’t that the education is not there, but many other things such as urban parents, teachers, and the urban society itself affect a child’s education. When looking at the mandatory test scores of minority inner city students, specifically African American students, they are significantly lower than White American suburban students, hence the achievement gap.
In turn, black pupils felt teachers underestimated their ability and picked on them. Gilborn and Youdell conclude that much of the conflict between white teachers and black pupils stem from the racial stereotypes that teachers hold, rather than the pupil’s actual behaviour. This disadvantages pupils because they are treated differently, which could result in their failure and even exclusion from school. As Jenny Bourne 1994) found that schools tend to see black boys as a threat and label them
Ethnic minorities are in there first generation of wealth and Marxist believe they primarily underachieve due to their class. Also they may not have the time and space at home to do school work. They may not have the funds for educational trips; and they
Washington’s views on "racial progress" were that offered black acquiescence in disenfranchisement and social segregation if whites would back the idea of black progress in education, agriculture, and economics. Agriculture to Washington was one of the soul ideas of his "racial progress" theory. Washington argued that the focus of African-Americans should be education on a trade so that they could be taught the skills they needed to be able to open up their own businesses. That would lead to African-Americans to create jobs for other African-Americans. Washington felt blacks shouldn’t worry about winning civil rights, but rather have some kind of economic stability first.
Although the end of the American civil war marked the end of slavery for African Americans, it did not mark their acceptance and equality with white people. Many southern states resented losing their slaves and were determined to keep African Americans as second class citizens. In 1950 segregation was in full force, meaning African Americans had separate churches, public transport, theatres, schools, hotels, swimming pools and many other facilities to white people. Segregation also applied to where people lived, so African Americans could only live in certain areas separate from white people, with these areas being much worse than the white suburbs, despite the separate but equal principle. Even when this was challenged in the Plessy vs Ferguson Supreme Court case the separate but equal principle was found to be constitutional.
Though the desegregation of schools in North Carolina granted blacks access to better educational resources and wealthier scholastic opportunities, the resultant dilution and erosion of the black educational community devastated its resolve and essential coherence. These negative effects of integration are only somewhat less visible even today. Black-only schools operated under astounding inequity before integration. With white schools hogging state funds, black administrators turned to their communities for support. When George Miller was principal in Wilkes County, NC, the community struggled to support the schools with funds, equipment, and food for the cafeteria.# Still, communities could provide very little, so educators adjusted their educational focus.