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Event:  Desegregation Program begins for St. Louis Public
Brief Description:  The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the landmark 1954 Brown V. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas case that segregated schools were unconstitutional. Although this led to the merger of the Harris and Stowe Teachers Colleges in 1955, the St. Louis Public Schools remained segregated. In 1972, Minnie Liddell, a parent of African American students in the St. Louis Public Schools, sued the school system when she received notice that her children were to be moved to a school that taught black students as opposed to the school where they were currently enrolled, which was predominantly white. This case resulted in the establishment of the Voluntary Interdistrict Desegregation Program, which allowed the transfer of students among the City school district and metropolitan districts in St. Louis County. It was the largest of its kind in the nation. In 2000, 13,500 African American students in the City rode buses to predominantly white schools in the County. As part of the plan, approximately 1,300 students from the county also rode buses to city magnet school, which offered specialized programs in performing arts, science and technology. The Liddell case was not actually settled until 1999, when City voters approved a sales tax designed to help end school desegregation. The busing of students still remains, but the involvement of individual districts varies and the future of the program is uncertain. ["Key Dates Pages of History", St. Louis Post-Dispatch, July 25, 1999;"Generation of City Students Has Grown Up With Busing", St. Louis Post-Dispatch, February 21, 2001]
Year:  1982
Decade:  1980 - 1989
Beginning Date:    1982

Events
Harris and Stowe Colleges merged

 

 

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