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Voluntary School Integration

January 11, 2008

NAACP Legal Defense Fund and Civil Rights Project/Proyecto Derechos Civiles Announce Manual on Voluntary School Integration

(New York, NY) The NAACP Legal Defense Fund (LDF) and the Civil Rights Project/Proyecto Derechos Civiles (CRP) announce the release of Still Looking to the Future: Voluntary K-12 School Integration; A Manual for Parents, Educators and Advocates. The Manual provides valuable guidance and information about how communities and school districts can promote racial diversity and address racial isolation in schools nationwide. This Second Edition of the Manual is being issued on the heels of the Supreme Court's June 2007 decision in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1, which limited the ability of school districts to take race into account in achieving these goals.

This is a critical time on the ground. School districts and communities around the country are struggling to determine how to continue their voluntary integration efforts within the bounds of the Court's decision. In some instances, school districts have hastily modified or abandoned diversity programs without carefully considering the options that are still viable under the Court's decision and taking proper account of the significant harms of racially segregated schools.

The Manual addresses the practical questions of what parents, advocates and educators can now do to promote diversity and address the harms of racial isolation in their schools. It provides accurate and up to date information and a step by step guide for how you can strengthen diversity and expand opportunity in your schools, including:

· The history of court-ordered desegregation efforts;
· The causes, patterns and devastating impact of the rapid resegregation currently occurring in America's public schools;
· A comprehensive discussion of many demonstrated benefits of racially integrated schools and the harms of racially isolated schools;
· A detailed review of the Supreme Court's Parents Involved decision;
· Brief description of the common methods of student assignment;
· Case studies of school districts with widely discussed approaches towards promoting high quality, inclusive schools.

To download the manual select the first item under Publications in the column to your right. For additional information, please visit LDF's School Integration website at www.naacpldf.org or the Civil Rights Project/Proyecto Derechos Civiles website at www.civilrightsproject.ucla.edu.

To request hard copies or CDs of the Manual and supplemental materials, please send an e-mail with your contact information and the number of copies requested to manual@naacpldf.org.