I consider the topic of wealth and privilege to be the most important. Educational equity is a measure of achievement, fairness, and opportunity. Allowing money and family status to determine where you live, what school you attend, and the means of which you can provide to your family make for an unfair playing field. Children do not get to determine the fait of their wealth, they either have everything handed to them or have to struggle to meet the bare minimums. Unfortunately a huge gap has formed between the elite, (typically white) and the less
fortunate (typically minority), this gap is defined by wealth and race. This gap has been extremely apparent this year regarding SAT and ACT testing and tutoring. This standardized test is crucial for acceptance to any college or university, and is extremely difficult to do well on without proper tutoring. The problem with wealth is that it gives the opportunity to do so much more and access the best help and resources possible, and for a lot of people hiring tutors that charge $250 an hour is completely out of the question. So then how are two children in the same grade going to ever be given an equal opportunity to learn if one is receiving extra help beyond school, and one is just learning what they learn in the classroom. It is very difficult for the child learning on his/her own to ever catch up to the child receiving that materials for success. That child gets the easy way out, and the less fortunate child must work, and work and work on their own
to achieve the same thing; it is not fair. I personally know students at my high school that could not afford the best tutors for the ACT or SAT and their scores show that. It is not their fault that their family has to spend/ budget their money differently and therefore cannot pay for the best of the best help. There should be a way around it, not just with the SAT or ACT but with school and standardized testing all around. It is the government and the schools job to provide an equal educational opportunity to all students and funding for such should not be based on what neighborhood you live in, how much money you make, or what school you go to. Schools should be monitored to see what each one really needs, specific to the type of student body they cater to and then be given what they need to achieve success. And the same should be done with wealthier schools, and if they realize they don't need as much, their budget should be given to other schools
that are in desperate need.
The Brown decision annihilated the “separate but equal” rule, previously sanctioned by the Supreme Court in 1896, that permitted states and school districts to designate some schools “whites-only” and others “Negroes-only.” More important, by focusing the nation’s attention on subjugation of blacks, it helped fuel a wave of freedom rides, sit-ins, voter registration efforts, and other actions leading ultimately to civil rights legislation in the late 1950s and 1960s. The Supreme Court decision was important in that it was one of the first times we saw affirmative action regarding race, education, and equally amongst the two. This was seen as a huge step towards equality at the time, but now it is nothing more then an act of legislation. Of course it was a extreme step in the right direction but in today's schools the term "separate but equal" does not stand to be true. Schools in wealthier,
superior neighborhoods are substantially better than schools in lower class, neighborhoods and this is seen in the schools themselves, the type of children attending, their motivation, and in the teachers attitudes. Although it is much better now than it was before, there still is a racial gap between academic success since the white population has been treated superior for a longer time. African Americans are still struggling to meet standard and work their way to the the top which is present in every aspect from, wealth to education. In addition to the schools themselves the resources provided to such schools are at drastic differences between the elite and the poor. Learning involves teachers, books, textbooks, computers, after school programs, all of which is necessary for students success but is not being given to every student. Brown v. Board of education was an amazing step towards educational equality but with it came many holes that need to be
filled such as: resources, zoning laws, racial bias, and school integration. All of these aspects and more need to be achieved for Brown v. Board of education to be fulfilled.
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