Improving Racial Balance and Intergroup Relations: an Advisory Report to the Board of Education, Inglewood Unified
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
DOCUMENT RESUME ED 025 571 UD 007 611 Improving Racial Balance and IntergroupRelations: An Advisory Report to the Boardof Education, Inglewood Unified School District. California State Dept. of Education. Sacramento.Bureau of Intergroup Relations. Pub Date Jun 68 Note-91p EDRS Price MF-$0.50 HC-$4.65 Descriptors-*Boards of Education,Educational Opportunities.EqualEducation,*Intergroup Relations, SchoolCommunity Negroes.PublicSchools,RacialAttitudes.RacialBalance.RacialComposition, Relationship School Personnel. Sensitivity Training.Student Distribution, Teachers Identifiers-Bureau of Intergroup Relations, CaliforniaInglewood An advisory report to the Boardof Education of the InglewoodUnified School District was prepared byCalifornia's Bureau of IntergroupRelations. The document contains a section on thepupil distribution in the publicschools. Also presented are such aspects of educational opportunityand intergroup relations asindicators of inequality. the "color blind" vs. "colorconscious" issue. a survey ofstaff attitudes, and staff training and sensitivity.Other sections are devoted to communityrelations and ways of improvingracial balance. A series ofrecommendations are included.(NH) VFW"( REPORT OF THE BUREAU OF INTERGROUP RELATIONS CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION / INGLEWOOD UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT 401 So. Inglewood Avenue Inglewood, California 90301 June, 1968 U.S. DEPARTMENT Of HEALTH,EDUCATION & WELFARE OFFICE OF EDUCATION RECEIVED FROM THE THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEENREPRODUCED EXACTLY AS POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONS PERSON OR ORGANIZATIONORIGINATING IT. REPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE OFEDUCATION STATED DO NOT NECESSARILY POSITION OR POLICY. CAUFORNIA STATEDEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION BUREAU OF INTERGROUPRELATIONS IMPROVING RACIALBALANCE ANDINTERGROUP RELATIONS An Advisory Report tothe Board of Education Inglewood Unified SchoolDistrict, Inglewood (prepared for submissionin June, 1968) BOARD OF EDUCATION Ted F. Merrill, President Dr. James B. Sheets,Vice-President Mrs. Esther M. Bode,Member Mr. Jerry Fine, Member Mr. Robert J. Goodyear,Member Dr. A. Neil Galluzzo,Executive Secretary IMPROVING ETHNIC BALANC AND INTERGROUP RELATIONS An advisory report to the Board of Education, Inglewood Upified School District California State Department of Education Office of Compensatory Education Bureau of Intergroup Relations June 1968 California State Department of Education Bureau of Intergroup Relations 721 Capitol Mall Sacramento 95814 June 1968 IMPROVING RACIAL BALANCE AND INTERGROUP RELATIONS An advisory rePort to the Boardof Education, In lewood Unified School District I. INTRODUCTION In January 1968, continuing anadvisory relationship with the Inglewood Unified School District that had begun inJuly 1966, the Bureau of Intergroup Relations was asked by Superintendent A. NeilGalluzzo and the Board of Educa- tion to conduct a team study of theInglewood schools and to advise the district regarding the improvement of racialbalance and intergroup relations. Members of the Bureau's consultant staffvisited Inglewood on numerous occasions during March, April and May,1968. Contacts were made with district administrators, principals,teachers, students,representatives of public and private agencies, members of community,civic, and school associations, and individual parents and citizens. Consultants who participated in the team study, under the direction of Ted Neff,Chief, Bureau of Intergroup Relations, were Gus Guichard, Eugene S.Hornell, and John Summerfield. The team received valuable assistancethrough the assembling of informa- tion and the frank expressioa of opinionby Dr. Galluzzo and many members of his staff. Special thanks are due to Charles Lesher,Chairman of the district's Committee on Human Relations andPrincipal at Monroe Junior High School,and Roy Rosenberg, tht. district's PublicInformation Officer. The problems and opportunities withwhich this report is concerned have been discussed in Inglewood for several years. In the summer of 1966, as the result of a federal grant, a special taskforce from what was then thedistrict's Committee on Intergroup Relations andProblems of Ethnic Assimilation wasable and issue the Report ofthe to make an in-depthstudy of education and race The Committee on HunanRela- Human Relations-Equal Opportunity Task Force. has spent many hours instudy tions, developing outof the previous group, and recommendations, and and discussion, haspresented a variety of reports District staff, PTA has implemented severalin-service trainiAg programs. Advisory groups, MorningsidePark Neighbors, theInglewood Stabilization Committee, and others haveconsidered solutions to theareds racial concerns, and equality of oppor- including imbalance in theschools, intergroup tension, tunity for all pupils. primarily upon intergroup This advisory report,it should be noted, centers relations mobless and programsfor their resolution,including alternative in schools of the dis- plans for achieving a moreequitable racial distribution positive efforts and trict. The report does notdescribe or assess all the Those aspects exemplary projects in whichthe district presently isengaged. impact on members of minority of education inInglewood which have special the subject of thisstudy. groups, or onrelationships between groups, are and problems of the Negro More specifically, emphasisis on the distribution questions minority, for reasons whichwill be noted later. It is hoped that the will help lead to improvededu- raised, problems noted,and suggestions offered helpful pre- cational efforts, and this report,therefore, should be taken as a critical evaluation. liminary effort to provideassistance rather than as a be expected to solve all It is true, of course,that education cannot institution where childrenlearn. social problems. A school is primarily an Nevertheless, each schooldistrict must accept itsshare of responsibility community, alleviating and leadership in working to overcomethe problems of its and confronting those which originate or areintensified in the schools, advantage of educational directly those which impair achild's ability to take Bureau of IntergroupRelations' opportunities. That is the basis of the administration and Board approach in this report andpresumably of the school of Education in invitingthe Bureau to conduct thestudy. Remaining sections of this report areas follows: II. Distribution of pupils inInglewood public schools III. Eaual opportunity andintergroup relations IV. Community relations V. Improving racial balance VI. Recommendations to the Board ofEducation VII. Appendix II. DISTRIBUTION OF PUPILS IN THEINGLEWOOD PUBLIC SCHOOLS located eight A. Profile of the community. The City of Inglewood is miles southwest of downtown LosAngeles, just northeast of theLos Angeles International Airport. It is bordered by LosAngeles to the east, northeast Lennox and west, where it adjoins theLos Angeles community ofWestchester. and Hawthorne border Inglewood tothe southwest and south. The Inglewood Unified School District servesthe City of Inglewood and the Ladera Heights area of Los AngelesCounty, which bordersInglewood to the northwest. Westchester, Lennox, Hawthorne,and Ladera Heights are almosttotally the east white in their racial composition,while the areas of Los Angeles to and northeast of Inglewood arepredominantly Negro. Historically, the movement of Negro population in LosAngeles has been from east to west,and the entrance of Negro families intoInglewood, which had no Negroresidents at the time of the 1960 census, has beenprimarily into Morningside Park, amiddle-class com- munity in the northeast portion ofthe city. The 1967 population ofInglewood, which is approximately nine squaremiles 125,000 to in size, was estimated at91,000. Population projections indicate 148,000 residents by 1980. Recent trends have included anincrease in apart- ments with small familysizes and an increase in thenumber of older indiv- iduals and couples, to say nothingof changing racial composition. The number of senior citizens hasdoubled during the last 30 years,while the number of children under 10 years of age hasdecreased four percent. The most expensive residential areas are in LaderaHeights and sections of MorningsidePark, while pockets of low-incomehousing surround the downtown areaand exist near Centinela Park and Center Park. The San Diego Freeway runs northand south through the western portionof Tnglewood, while the city also isphysically divided into eastern and western portions along Prairie Avenue bythe Inglewood Park Cemetery, Forum,Inglewood Golf Course, and Hollywood Parkracetrack, which lie just to the east of Prairie. Almost the entire Negro population of the city resides east of Prairie. Inglewood historically was the retail and business center of southwestern Los Angeles County. However, development of large adjacent shopping centers in recent years has cut into retail sales. The Inglewood industrial area is a small portion of the airport industrial complex,and prime contractors and subcontractors for the aerospace and missile industry are vital to the area. Basic and applied research, scientific instrumentation and 11.-Ehinery,and other manufacturing also are important. Northrop Institute of Technology, a four-year technical college specializing in engineeringand aeronautics is located in Inglewood, while the racetrack and Forum already have been mentioned. B. The schools. The Inglewood Unified School District operates 12 elementary schools (K-6), one elementary school (K-3), one elementary school (4-6), two junior