GCSE America
The Civil Rights Movement
The Campaign for Civil Rights in Education
- The belief that all people regardless of skin color should have the right to a decent education.
- 1n 1945 the two areas where segregation and racism was most obviously applied was in housing and education.
- In the southern states the African Americans lived in the poorest areas with the worst facilities.
- Without a good education no-one could advance themselves in society.
- Therefore a poor education guaranteed a poor lifestyle for the African Americans.
- Within the south the general philosophy was that an educated ‘boy’ could become a danger. There was also a belief that they were not intelligent enough deserve an education.
1896 Supreme Court: ‘Separate but Equal’
- This was a law that established that segregation was allowed in education but the provision for all students at schools and colleges of further education had to be the same.
- However this was not the case.
- There was certainly no equality in the standards of schools for black and white children. Black schools had few teachers, few classrooms and few books.
- Equal facilities did not exist in further education colleges:
- no black college existed where it was possible to study for a PhD
- no black college existed where it was possible to study engineering or architecture
- law could only be studied at two colleges
- medicine could only be studied at two colleges