In Whose Interest: Chicago Schools in the 1960s

Abstract

Chicago Public Schools has a longstanding history of segregation and inequality. As a result of inequality, organizers created an educational reform movement in the 1960s. During the Civil Rights and black Power Movements, Chicago organizers demanded quality education for black youth first in the form of desegregation and later through substantive changes at the schools Blacks already attended. Civil rights activists organized boycotts, sit-ins, court cases, a Title VI complaint and other forms of demonstrations, which resulted in ineffective permissive transfer plans, but not in the massive desegregation of Chicago Public Schools as many activists had hoped. During the Black Power era, students, teachers, and community organizations utilized similar tactics, such as boycotts and sit-ins, but their desire for the improvement of schools where blacks already attended led to a number of their demands being met.