The Right Reverend William Henry Marmion was consecrated as bishop of the Diocese of Southwestern Virginia on May 13, 1954, days prior to the Brown v. Board of Education decision and just over a decade after the Episcopal Church's General Convention formally opposed racial discrimination. A diocesan conference center in Hungry Mother State Park, purchased soon after his consecration, sparked a controversy that was to smolder and flame for the first decade of Marmion's 25 years as bishop. Marmion led the move to desegregate the diocesan conference center, Hemlock Haven, in 1958 and subsequently effected integration by closing three of the four black churches in the diocese and inviting members to choose a neighboring church to join. The initial integration of the diocese was a turbulent process that centered around Hemlock Haven. The diocese moved with some difficulty towards racial integration in a microcosm of what was happening in the wider Church and in the United States. Historical documents, secondary sources, interviews, and theoretical understanding of minority responses to oppression help me to describe this time of racial desegregation of the Diocese of Southwestern Virginia and its implications. Critical theory gleaned from W. E. B. Du Bois and from Homi Bhabha informs my understanding of some of the implications as well as many of the actions and outcomes. Du Bois's notion of double consciousness and Bhbaba's similar term hybridity, both of which acknowledge a dual locus of identity and of power, are relevant to understanding some of the interactions revealed by primary source correspondence. I will focus on Hemlock Haven as the entry point into desegregation and on the black churches in the diocese, both before and after that critical point, adding the witness of black voices to the white narrative of this history. A historical look at the trajectory of race and race relations in the Episcopal Church informs the moment of the caesura--an interruption--the desegregation of Hemlock Haven, and the fate of the four black churches in the diocese. From the point of the rupture comes identification, the emergence of a new space, a cultural reboot. / Ph. D.

This thesis is a history of social and political activism in Charlottesville during the 1960s focusing on new left student organizing at the University of Virginia. It is a work of social history that establishes a community that has been generally ignored in traditional histories of the new left as one of the most influential centers of new left activism in the South and asserts that this prominence was due to years of activism by local liberals, civil rights advocates, and students during the city's unique experiences on the front lines of the southern desegregation, civil rights, and anti-war struggles. It traces the evolution of social activism in the city and the university from the late 1950s through the early 1970s and demonstrates how local activists and issues interacted with regional, national, and global events during one of the most socially tumultuous decades in American history.

This paper seeks to insert the voices of students into the historical discussion of public school integration in New Orleans. While history tends to ignore the memories of children that experienced integration firsthand, this paper argues that those memories can alter our understanding of that history. In 1963, Benjamin Franklin High School was the first public high school in New Orleans to integrate. Black students knowingly made sacrifices to transfer to Ben Franklin, as they were socially and politically conscious teenagers. Black students formed alliances with some white teachers and students to help combat the racist environment that still dominated their school and city. Ben Franklin students were maturing adolescents worked to establish their identities in this newly integrated, intellectually advanced space. This paper explores the way in which students – of differing racial, socio-economic, religious, educational, and political upbringings – all struggled to navigate self and space in this discordant society.

The Kansas City School District was unable to attain accreditation from 1955 until 2016, enduring high dropout rates, exceptionally low college entrance rates, and poor performances on standardized tests. At the district’s fine arts school, students also experienced these low educational outcomes. But despite these educational setbacks, the fine arts training they received appears to have contributed to their successful long-term outcomes in adulthood. The purpose of this case study is to explore the factors that contributed to talent development and overall thriving among adult artists who attended the fine arts school in this low performing school district. The research questions include 1) How do the artists describe the experience of developing their talent while attending an unaccredited high school? 2) What factors do the artists identify that aided in the emergence and continual development of their artistic practice? I interviewed 8 adult artists (aged 34-37) who discussed experiences that catalyzed and contributed to the development of their artistic talent. I identify themes and interpret data using grounded theory. Based on existing research about talent development, this study might show that these students thrived because the fine arts school they attended prioritized talent development over core content standards. The focus on talent development appears to have cultivated certain intrapersonal traits—such as awareness, motivation, and perseverance—which may account for their success as adults. Such identifiable traits are relevant to the “21st century skills” that are emerging in the education community. By understanding these artists’ experiences through a case study, educators and policymakers may have a clearer picture of how talent development helps to cultivate 21st century skills in students.

Mrs. Esther Brown, a White Jewish woman, made a significant contribution to the desegregation of public education in the 1940s. This research study establishes her role in the development of desegregation policy in public education in the contemporary public narrative on desegregation policy in the early1950s, the challenges to the implementation of the desegregation of public education, and the local context that led to the national fight against desegregation. The significance of this study is to highlight the struggles that activists, many of whom are unsung heroes, went through to navigate the struggles and processes that enabled the desegregation of public education in America.

This project examines the activism of Black parents, students, and citizens who fought to obtain school equality and desegregation from the 1920s until the 1960s in southwest Virginia and consequently the resistance from White residents and officials. Resistance to the status quo of inequality between Black and White schools in Pulaski County, Virginia began as early as the 1920s. This activism continued through the 1930s and 1940s, with it finally leading NAACP attorneys Oliver Hill and Spottswood Robinson collaborating with Pulaski citizens in 1948 to file a discrimination lawsuit in the case Corbin v. School Board of Pulaski County. The activism did not end here as once the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that segregated schools were unconstitutional, Black residents in southwest Virginia localities such as Floyd, Galax, Grayson, and Pulaski worked together with NAACP attorney Reuben Lawson to file multiple lawsuits so Black students could attend White schools. Many of these lawsuits faced staunch resistance from White residents of these localities, even with the threat of closing schools due to Virginia's policy of Massive Resistance. I argue that looking at localities such as Pulaski, Floyd, Galax, and Grayson helps situate southwest Virginia into the larger context of Virginia history in terms of examining resistance, fighting for equality, and pushing desegregation in the area during the middle of the twentieth century. Black citizens in the western part of Virginia faced resistance from the White citizens, but they persevered with their activism in the courts and hometowns which ultimately contributed to the dismantling of segregated schools in Virginia. They pushed for equality within segregation and then for desegregation in the middle decades of the twentieth century. Examining the historiography of school equality and desegregation in Virginia demonstrates that there is an overgeneralization about the resistance which occurred in the western half of the state. Historians argue that the eastern part of the state saw more modes of resistance, especially Massive Resistance, due to the higher population of Black residents. On the other hand, they ignore the western part as they believe the same resistance did not occur due to a lower population of Black residents. I reject these notions as Massive Resistance found its way into southwest Virginia through either the threat of or action of closing schools. I have dug more deeply into the sources, such as trial transcripts, legal correspondence, school board records, petitions, court cases, testimony, newspapers, and oral histories to understand the avenues Black residents in southwest Virginia used to fight inequality and segregation. / Master of Arts / This project examines the activism of Black parents, students, and citizens who fought to obtain school equality and desegregation from the 1920s until the 1960s in southwest Virginia and consequently the resistance from White residents and officials. Resistance to the status quo of inequality between Black and White schools in Pulaski County, Virginia began as early as the 1920s. This activism continued through the 1930s and 1940s, with it finally leading NAACP attorneys Oliver Hill and Spottswood Robinson collaborating with Pulaski citizens in 1948 to file a discrimination lawsuit in the case Corbin v. School Board of Pulaski County. The activism did not end here as once the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that segregated schools were unconstitutional, Black residents in southwest Virginia localities such as Floyd, Galax, Grayson, and Pulaski worked together with NAACP attorney Reuben Lawson to file multiple lawsuits so Black students could attend White schools. Many of these lawsuits faced staunch resistance from White residents of these localities, even with the threat of closing schools due to Virginia's policy of Massive Resistance. I argue that looking at localities such as Pulaski, Floyd, Galax, and Grayson helps situate southwest Virginia into the larger context of Virginia history in terms of examining resistance, fighting for equality, and pushing desegregation in the area during the middle of the twentieth century. Black citizens in the western part of Virginia faced resistance from the White citizens, but they persevered with their activism in the courts and hometowns which ultimately contributed to the dismantling of segregated schools in Virginia. They pushed for equality within segregation and then for desegregation in the middle decades of the twentieth century.

The problem of this study was to ascertain the role and status of the specialist in human relations in the desegregation of selected public schools in Texas. Its purpose was to review human relations literature in order to compile a list of representative criteria for human relations programs in industry and to describe the human relations programs and roles of the directors in selected schools. An analysis of available information indicated that industrial organizations have given more attention to human relations programs than have the educational institutions of this country, although their problems have been similar. It was in the workshops of the factories, rather than in the classrooms of America, that social scientists developed human relations skills and techniques. The social issue of desegregation of the races has been a battle often fought on public school campuses. These racial confrontations, coupled with conflicts spawned by the rigidity of traditional schools, have signaled the urgent call for human relations programs to alleviate human problems. The background study included a review of relevant literature, interviews with public school officials, and discussions with state and regional educational administrators. The survey technique was used to collect data for the study. Personal interviews were held with public school officials from five representative districts. The remaining participants responded to mailed questionnaires. The following procedures were used to develop the survey questionnaire: (1) construction of the initial survey questionnaire, (2) selection of a jury panel to validate the questionnaire, (3) validation of the questionnaire, (4) construction of the final questionnaire, and (5) administration of the validated questionnaire.

This thesis describes, classifies, analyzes and evaluates the rhetoric of resistance to forced busing to desegregate the Dallas Independent School District during the 1975-1976 school year. This thesis also applies the characteristics of social, protest and agitational movements to the antibusing movement in Dallas to determine the effectiveness of the resistance rhetoric. The findings of this case study demonstrate that, although the Dallas protesters did not achieve all of their goals, their resistance rhetoric did accomplish specific, effective results. However, this thesis also concludes that, in the American system of government, neither violent nor non-violent resistance can prevent implementation of court-ordered busing.

During the years following Brown v. Board of Education, the U.S. district courts assumed the burden of implementing that decision across the country. The purpose of this study is to examine the role of the district court judges in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in that effort. The primary sources used are the district, appellate and Supreme Court opinions. This study concludes that many background variables used to study judicial behaviour are ineffective in this geographical area because of the homogeneity of the judges' backgrounds. But, as indicated by the Johnson appointments, a president can select judges that have a particular attitude toward an issue such as integration, if he has the desire and the political acumen to do so.

In recent years several municipalities in Sweden have merged their public secondary schools. This has been considered a type of initiative that intends to reduce youth segregation and discrepancies in school quality. This thesis examines in what ways the merging of all public secondary schools in a municipality affects the students’ academic performance and their choice to enroll in the publicschool sector. To do so I use municipality-level aggregate data from the Swedish National Agency for Education on 9th grade students’ academic outcomes and the share of 7th graders enrolled in the public schools. I employ a difference-in-difference approach to estimate the reduced form effect of the school mergers. The control group used in the baseline estimation includes all municipalities that had a constant number of public secondary schools during the time period of my study. I move on to use propensity score matching in order to create a more comparable control group. I then estimate a difference-in-difference regression with match-fixed effects. The results show that the mergers have a negative effect on the municipality-level average GPA. In addition, the municipalities where the mergers have been implemented experience a reduction in the share of students that pass all 9th grade subjects as well as an increase in the share of students who do not have sufficient grades to continue to upper secondary school. The school mergers caused the share of 7th graders enrolled in the publicschool sector to decrease by approximately 10 percentage points. These results indicate that the public secondary school merger is not a panacea for improving student outcomes.