School Segregation and Its Discontents

Suburbanization, Segregation, and Inequality

Twenty-first century metropolitan school segregation is a multi-dimensional phenomenon associated with decades of middle class flight from cities to suburbs, as well as concentrations of poverty and social isolation in urban neighborhoods (Kimelberg & Billingham, 2013). Following Brown and Milliken, metropolitan area-wide desegregation plans involving urban and suburban district mergers occurred only in a few exceptional cases, such as Wilmington, Delaware, and Louisville, Kentucky, but most federally mandated desegregation initiatives did not cross district boundaries (Glenn, 2011). Subsequently, most studies of school desegregation focused on outcomes within districts indicating that some desegregation occurred during the 1970s and 1980s, followed by what has been defined as the resegregation of schools by race and income (Orfield, 2001; Orfield, Frankenberg, & Lee, 2003). Some scholars argue that federal abandonment of school desegregation policies, and the absence of policies to address residential segregation, propelled the resegregation of public schools (Clotfelter, 2006; Frankenberg & Lee, 2002; Horsford, 2011; Orfield & Lee, 2006). Others attribute current patterns of racial and class segregation to demographic changes in the population as well as to the effects of charter schools and school choice plans (Logan, 2004; Mohl, 2003; Saporito & Lareau, 1999; Saporito & Sohoni, 2006).

Recent studies suggest the importance of examining patterns of segregation within metropolitan areas (Frankenberg, 2009; Smrekar & Goldring, 2009). Clotfelter identifies three components: within district, between district, and between public and private. He confirms that between 1970 and 2000 within-district segregation declined, but between-district segregation actually doubled. And he attributes this increase in school segregation to the legacies of Brown and Milliken, which limited the reach of federal desegregation decisions across school boundaries (Clotfelter, 2006).

Scholars may dispute the causes of 21st-century school segregation, but most agree about the effects. Since the 1966 Coleman Report (Coleman, 1966), studies consistently document the negative effects of school segregation, particularly for concentrations of low-income students of color, and show the positive effects of reducing segregation for all children, both academically and socially (Goldsmith, 2009). To address intradistrict inequities, some countywide districts, including Nashville–Davidson, Tennessee (consolidated in 1962) and Charlotte–Mecklenburg North Carolina (consolidated in 1960), now provide additional instructional resources for schools in disadvantaged neighborhoods to counter the negative effects of concentrations of poor and minority students within districts (Goldring, Cohen-Vogel, Smrekar, & Taylor, 2006).

However, intradistrict remedies do not apply to disadvantaged students in counties and metropolitan areas divided by multiple districts. Furthermore, the national trend of consolidating or maintaining the number of school districts has reversed. Prior to the 1990s, the number of school districts in the United Stated had been declining. Since 1992, however, “there has been an increase of nearly one thousand new school districts, an increase of more than 6 percent” (Frankenberg, 2009, p. 873). The proliferation of new municipal districts leads “to increasing segregation largely due to racial differences across boundary lines” (Frankenberg, 2009, p. 870). The formation of smaller, municipal districts increases metropolitan fragmentation, exacerbating segregation and inequality between districts, particularly between urban and suburban ones.

Suburbanization in the United States, fueled by the expansion of automobile ownership and interstate highways, and federal housing policies, exacerbates residential segregation by class and race. Since World War II, the urban core has become increasingly identified with poor people, crime, abandoned buildings, and declining property values, whereas middle- and upper-income suburbs have become associated with accumulated wealth, security, and upward mobility (Jackson, 1985). For decades, these policies and perceptions have influenced homeowner decisions to locate their families in suburban neighborhoods and school districts. Typically, higher status White parents define “better” schools as those that enroll students similar to their own children in terms of race and class, and they expect residential segregation to offer them significant educational and economic benefits (Holme, 2002; Shapiro, 2004). Members of all minority groups associate upward mobility with greater proximity to Whites; however, the prospects of residential integration with minorities—especially Blacks—threaten a loss of status for Whites (Charles, 2005). Despite a preponderance of survey data charting decades of declines in racially prejudiced attitudes, some scholars suggest that a new racism has emerged. In the post–civil rights era, overt expressions of racism have given way to a “color-blind racism” that obscures the institutional basis for White privilege (Bonilla-Silva, 2014). Boundaries, both political and symbolic, protect institutions. Consequently, suburban residents can rely on boundaries dividing cities and suburbs, as well as suburban school districts, for protecting “better” schools and neighborhoods. Because of Milliken, they can claim local autonomy as a constitutionally protected right, avoiding expressions of overtly racist sentiments when supporting separate districts.

Historically, debates about school consolidation and desegregation usually have involved tensions between advancing civil rights and protecting local autonomy. In some school district consolidations, voters in local referenda have exercised local autonomy by making “voluntary” decisions (Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, 1960; Nashville and Davidson County, Tennessee, 1962). Other mergers, however, were “forced,” for example, mandated by state legislation, sometimes after the failure of a merger referendum (Raleigh and Wake County, North Carolina, 1976), or, by judicial order following litigation to correct racial inequities (Louisville and Jefferson County, Kentucky, 1975). Consequently, some residents may have believed that local autonomy was compromised to advance civil rights. In the post–civil rights era, however, most merger efforts throughout the United States have been initiated by state boards of education and state legislatures encouraging and in some cases, incentivizing mergers of small and depopulating districts to improve efficiencies and achieve economies of scale (Wisconsin and Nebraska).

Theoretical Perspective

This case study is informed by theories of durable inequality and social closure, theories not usually applied to studies of school segregation and the construction of school district boundaries (Fiel, 2013; Tilly, 1998; Weber, 1978). District boundaries between urban and suburban schools, as well as distinctions between public and private schools, constructed long ago, still stand as legitimate categories in the minds of residents and in the eyes of the law. Hence, explicit categorical boundaries, past and present, distinguish between insiders and outsiders, advantaged and disadvantaged. Durable inequality depends on the institutionalization of unequal categorical pairs to maintain “deeply unequal social arrangements” among socially defined categories of people (Tilly, 1998, p. 6). By theorizing school segregation as social closure, a means of keeping others out, and divided school districts as a means of maintaining unequal access to resources, I will show how categorical distinctions between unequal pairs, for example, city and county, Black and White, urban and suburban, contribute to inequalities that persist over individual lifetimes and organizational histories (Tilly, 1998; Weber, 1978).

Memphis: The Case Study

The selection of Memphis for the case study is important for a study of segregation, social closure, and durable inequality. Unlike typical mergers that occurred before 1980, this merger combined the larger MCS district of more than 100,000 students, 85% of whom were African American, with the smaller SCS system of 47,000 students, 52% of whom were White. The combined enrollment of 147,000 students and expansion of the unified county district to include Shelby County’s 800 square miles created one of the largest public school districts in the United States, comparable with the Raleigh Wake County school district in North Carolina (Williams, 2013). Also, unlike cities involved in those earlier mergers, both Memphis and Shelby County are majority Black. According to the U.S. Census, Memphis is 63% Black and Shelby County (including Memphis) is 53% Black (http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/47/47157.html). Significantly, when the population of Shelby County excludes City of Memphis residents, Shelby County is 66% White and 26% Black.

Memphis has a unique history of collaboration and conflict within a racially polarized setting. The city escaped harm during the Civil War only to be decimated by three yellow fever epidemics in the 1870s. After the epidemics, city debt, and loss of the city charter, Memphis upgraded its health and sanitation infrastructure, the state restored its charter, and Whites regained political power. A steady migration of rural Blacks and Whites helped the city recover. These newcomers, along with survivors, and returnees who evacuated during the epidemics, created a city associated with social tensions as well as cultural innovation. By mid-20th century, Memphis music—blues, soul, and rock and roll—gained global recognition (Rushing, 2009). However, conflicts over social inequality also took place. The most noteworthy conflicts occurred with the 1968 Sanitation Workers’ Strike, which culminated in the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., followed by school desegregation battles, which accelerated White flight to the suburbs, and produced one of the largest and most racially segregated private school “systems” in the United States (Reardon & Yun, 2002).

Decades of White flight from the urban core created population declines that city officials offset by gradual annexation of unincorporated Shelby County. However, the 2010 Census indicated that Memphis actually lost residents for the first time since the yellow fever epidemics, while municipalities gained population (Charlier, 2010, 2011). Data also confirmed that Blacks suffered greater economic losses than Whites during the Great Recession (Powell, 2010). The MCS board surrendered its special school district charter in 2010, during a period of significant economic stress and uncertainty. Not surprisingly, the process of creating a unified SCS district stirred old conflicts, fears, and resentments and provoked resistance.

Research Methods

This case study analysis investigates a contemporary school district merger within its real-life context using a qualitative research design (Feagin, Orum, & Sjoberg, 1991; Weiss, 2004; Yin, 2009). Data were obtained from a review of documents, including newspapers and census data, observations made at public forums addressing the merger, and interviews with young community leaders, people who came of age during or after the civil rights era. A total of 30 semi-structured interviews were conducted between May 1 and November 15 of 2012, the time period between court rulings that framed the merger. In face-to-face interviews, young community leaders were asked about their life experiences, their understanding of local issues, and their views about the future of the city of Memphis. The interviews were recorded and transcribed. Although confidentiality was not guaranteed, pseudonyms are used.

Snowball sampling, sometimes referred to as chain referral sampling, was used to find and recruit participants. Initial participants involved prominent and visible community leaders who agreed to be interviewed, then provided names and contact information for the next wave of participants, and so on (Heckathorn, 1997; Weiss, 1994). This technique is a powerful one for identifying a geographically concentrated population that shares common characteristics and associates with each other through networks. In this case, it helped identify individuals in Memphis who perform leadership roles in business, education, government, and non-profits. Most of the participants were born in Memphis or grew up there, and all of them came of age in the post–civil rights era. Two were the children of immigrant parents, but were born in the United States, and 2 were born in Mexico. Most had spent time away from the city after high school while pursuing educational and occupational opportunities. Two non-native Memphians met their spouses at out-of-state universities but moved to Memphis with them to be near their families. Most had attended public schools through high school, although 4 men (2 White and 2 Black) attended elite prep schools. Two women (1 White and 1 Black) recalled their childhood experiences with desegregation and school transfers (one public, one private). All participants had attended college with one exception who pursued post-secondary professional training in the arts. Many of them were first-generation college graduates; 27 held undergraduate degrees, and most had earned post-graduate degrees. Schools attended included local colleges and universities, Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) in Tennessee and other states, and public and private universities in the United States and Europe, including Ivy League schools. Occupations ranged from CEOs in business and non-profits, digital entrepreneurs, higher education faculty, community organizers, and positions in state and local government. Three held elective office. Most of the participants were in their 30s and 40s, 2 were aged 50 or older, and 5 were in their 20s. The participants included 15 African Americans (9 men and 6 women), 13 Whites (7 men and 6 women), and 2 Hispanics (1 man and 1 woman).

A New Generation of Leadership

The interviews were conducted as part of a separate study of a new generation of community leaders in Memphis, which focuses on the biographies of community leaders, their understandings about leadership and local issues, and their assessments of the future of the city. Based on age, education, and work experiences, they fit what President Obama has referred to as “‘the Joshua generation’—the successful, talented, networking, and in many cases, idealistic daughters and sons who benefitted from struggles that they could not have known firsthand” (Remnick, 2008). Some veterans of the civil rights era, also known as the “Moses” generation, have identified this younger generation as “the real fruits of the civil-rights movement” (Samuel, 2007). Or, in the words of Reverend Raphael Warnok, pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church, speaking at Coretta Scott King’s funeral, “the generation that left bondage in Egypt wandered for four decades . . . but it was their children who were the first to enter the Promised Land” (Cobb, 2010, p. 96). In Memphis and other cities, members of the Joshua generation (men and women, Black and White) occupy leadership positions that may not have been open to most of them 50 or 60 years ago. Shaped by diverse experiences, they may view the world differently from an earlier generation of leaders. As noted by activist Roger Wilkins, “people born in 1961 see the world differently than people born in 1931” (Samuel, 2007).

Studies show that African Americans and women are more likely to earn college and advanced degrees than they were in 1961, and are more likely to have attended racially and ethnically diverse schools (Frankenberg & Orfield, 2012; Kao & Thompson, 2003). Consequently, as a new generation of leadership finds itself facing new conflicts and old divisions, it may question the persistence of inequality and its connection to segregation.

Background: Dual Governments, Separate School Districts

A long-simmering dispute over dual public school districts escalated when a local referendum for consolidating city and county governments failed to win constitutionally required dual majorities in the city and county on November 2, 2010. In Shelby County outside Memphis, voters overwhelmingly rejected the metro charter with 85% voting against it. In the City of Memphis, voters passed metro government consolidation by a narrow margin with 51% voting in favor. Despite metro charter provisions excluding school districts from the merger, and protecting local governments in all incorporated towns, some county opponents expressed fears that merging city and county governments would lead to consolidating public school districts, paying higher taxes, and losing protected suburban enclaves. Fears of metro government precipitating a school merger dominated public discourse in Shelby County and gelled opposition, but some critics living in the city opposed the metro charter precisely because it excluded schools from the merger.

Most interviewees in this study supported the 2010 metro government initiative, and some had participated in the metro charter campaign. None opposed the metro merger, and most were surprised at the level of opposition. Going forward, most expected functional consolidation to occur across city and county lines, with or without merging governments.

I think it’s a no-brainer and I think [it] will eventually happen anyway. I think that the city and the county are going to find ways to consolidate departments more than they have already done because it’s just—it makes sense in terms of their dollars and resources. (Sandy, White female, age 32)

From a pragmatic political perspective, some thought that the school merger should have preceded the metro government initiative, because the process was easier, that is, it did not require dual majorities in both city and county referenda, and it would have eliminated the biggest obstacle to metro government—school consolidation.

I knew the process to merging the school systems was an easier process, because Memphis could vote [in a city referendum] on what we ended up doing [surrendering the MCS special charter]. That was a better way to start since that’s the main sticking point to [metro government] consolidation. (Jeff, African American male, age 38)

Agreeing that the desire to maintain separate suburban school districts undermined the metro government initiative, some speculated about the prospects of another metro government referendum after school consolidation eliminated the greatest obstacle.

I think people didn’t want the merger of the city and county because they were afraid of what would happen to the schools. And now, it’s happening to the schools. So I think if the conversation would’ve come up again, I don’t know if people would have voter fatigue at this point, but if it were to come up again in the near future, I think people would actually say, well, we might as well now consolidate the fire and police, public safety. I mean, at this point, why not? (Rick, African American male, age 30)

Most supporters of metro government were less sanguine about community relations after the metro government initiative failed, seeing new obstacles.

It gave me a real reality check in terms of where we are right now and what we have to wrestle with to get people’s minds geared in a different—more progressive—way. And that’s both within the city limits and outside the city limits . . . I can’t say that I left the process encouraged, but I did leave it informed. (Martin, African American male, age 39)

Opposition to metro government aggravated urban–suburban tensions. Entrenched attitudes about maintaining separate boundaries prevailed over discussions of having a more efficient consolidated government, generating more distrust, and confounding leadership.

It’s sad to me that we can’t come together as a community. And I’m not really clear as to why people truthfully would vote against it [metro government]. And I think it’s one of the reasons why we are not progressing as quickly as a community. And the interesting thing—it was one of the first times that I recognized in a campaign that facts aren’t enough. (Natalie, African American female, age 32)

Obstacles to getting the message across to voters with facts about the benefits of metro government led to unintended consequences:

I think that there were pieces of that that we didn’t handle well. The schools being one of the clearer parts of that in terms of we’re not even going to think about the schools so don’t worry about the schools. But it was like the lady that protests too much by talking about how we were not going to talk about the schools. So much that on the one hand, it got the school board geared up in this charter application thing they decided to do. (Sandy, White female, age 32)

Surrendering the MCS Charter

The November 2010 election brought defeat for the local metro government charter and set the stage for a battle over separate school districts. That same year, Tennessee Republicans won an unprecedented majority in both houses of the legislature and captured the governor’s office. Shifts in the state political structure favored the Republican minority in the Shelby County delegation. Consequently, members of the all-White, all-suburban SCS board saw a political opportunity for lifting a state ban on creating special school districts in the 2011 legislative session. The ban had been in effect since 1982 when a democratic legislature passed it after special school districts proliferated in Tennessee following school desegregation mandates in the 1970s. Lifting the ban would permit municipalities to separate from SCS, establishing their own special school districts and devising alternate funding strategies.

A few years earlier, the MCS and SCS school boards commissioned a joint study of the fiscal impact of creating suburban special school districts. The study by researchers at the University of Memphis titled “Impact of a Special School District on Memphis and Shelby County” showed outcomes for alternative financing strategies, and some were negative for the city (Redding, Menifield, & Santo, 2008). Shelby County suburbs contain about 28% of the Memphis and Shelby County population but contribute nearly one half of the county’s residential property tax base supporting both school systems. MCS board members felt that city schools could not risk losing any county tax support.

I think if you were to downplay the merger of the school systems by thinking that it was about diversifying the schools or taking over Shelby County schools when primarily it was about protecting the money. (Jeff, African American male, age 38)

What began as an economic issue—maintaining the tax base—became a civil rights issue as MCS board members considered the consequences. A special school district status for SCS and a new taxing authority would shift the allocation of deployable resources toward the suburbs, establishing a more inequitable system of public education, and thereby creating a civil rights issue.

Because it all started—the whole thought of unifying and coming together was the byproduct of the economic reason why we pushed for this, because we can see up the road. I’m just still praying that we don’t squander this opportunity. I knew that if Memphis City Schools surrendered its charter, I knew that there would be a push for the cities to form their own system or try to do whatever they could. And I knew they would have support from the state legislature. But as I told somebody, that doesn’t mean we don’t—that this is not the right thing for us to do. (Felicia, African American female, age 41)

In a preemptive move on December 20, 2010, the MCS board took the first step toward creating a unified SCS district by approving a resolution to surrender its special school district charter, which the city had held since 1869. The board’s decision was subject to ratification by the city council and a city voter referendum. Then, as required by state law, the county school district would assume responsibility for educating all students residing in the county (Robertson, 2011).

One MCS board member viewed the MCS charter surrender as an exercise in local autonomy for city residents. He emphasized that the surrender decision occurred legally, within the boundaries of existing law; moreover, the decision was made locally without lobbying the state legislature in Nashville for assistance.

And so Memphis City Schools and the decision that we made—the only way that we could have made that decision was that we were empowered to do so by state law. And we were. It wasn’t a thing that we lobbied to have a law changed; it was a law that was already on the books. (Ben, African American male, age 44)

However, suburban leaders asserted their own local autonomy, responding to the MCS charter surrender with renewed efforts to form separate municipal school districts. In February 2011, the newly seated legislature in Nashville passed a bill to structure a school merger in Shelby County, permitting the city referendum on surrendering the charter to take place as scheduled in March. It also included a provision for lifting the state ban on special school districts when consolidation was completed, enabling municipalities to create special school districts. The new legislation was sponsored by the Republican majority leader state Senator Mark Norris, and House State and Local Government Chairman Curry Todd, both from Collierville, an affluent Shelby County municipality.

Some young leaders championed the MCS decision to surrender the charter as bold. Others were more ambivalent, but most of them regretted the separatist response in the six municipalities.

I did appreciate the city schools’ bold move of: “Just, fine. We’re not a district anymore.” Like, I was, okay. Well played; right? But it was so disheartening to see all the—like Germantown and Collierville and Bartlett break into their own separate [districts] once city schools were dissolved. (Sara, White female, age 27)

Most community leaders understood the fiscal situation and respected MCS board members for their willingness to make tough choices; however, some expressed ambivalence about the surrender decision:

I think they felt like they did what they had to do. I don’t know if it was noble or not. I think they think it was. I have no idea. I really don’t know. I think it’s way too complex to know. (Mary, White female, age 50)

The issue of divisiveness between the city and suburbs came up many times. Some respondents ignored or downplayed the divisiveness that preceded the school merger conflict, seemingly attributing divisiveness to the unilateral MCS board decision to surrender the charter:

I do support on record consolidation of the schools. The way that it went about I’m not in agreement with it. I think that every move you make should be strategic and I don’t think there was strategy around the moving parts. And so at any rate, to that end it’s a lot of—you created a lot of tension, a lot of division and people who are just not hearing either side. (Tiffany, African American female, age 35)

The charter surrender process troubled others who viewed the unilateral decision by MCS as undemocratic and damaging to community-building because it violated local autonomy in the suburbs. Consequently, pursuing a legal remedy through litigation and enacting new legislation supporting municipal schools seemed inevitable and possibly a reasonable outcome.

I think that unilateralness [sic] that the surrender occurred, and the fact that there was no say from outside the city of Memphis poisoned the waters from the very beginning. (Jacob, White male, age 33)

Some went so far to say that city leaders caused the damage and divisiveness and needed to take action for repairing the damage and building consensus in the suburbs.

I’m not speaking for myself now necessarily but I’m trying to paraphrase the way that it’s felt in the suburbs, it felt like sort of a sneak attack. That there was going to be this sort of legislative trick that was going to allow the city of Memphis to overnight absorb parts of the suburbs that did not want to be absorbed. And it was always the city school system dissolving itself with no announcement in this extremely dramatic way, that the suburbs had no say and it became this war of self-determination. And I think that the school system and the government as a whole has a lot of work to do in terms of repairing its image and becoming attractive to itself before it can bring the suburbs into its orbit so to speak. (Steve, White male, age 32)

The issues of local autonomy and democracy were viewed by others as clearly in the hands of Memphis city residents and voters who make up the majority of Shelby County residents.

So I personally believe what the city school district did the city of Memphis should be able to do. And so if you go back and look at the votes, the consolidation actually passed in the city but failed in the county. And so similarly to how the county says that they have a right of self-determination, I would love to see someone bring back up the city council—the merger—and actually make the legal argument that we should have the right to self-determination of what we want to do as a city. And we should be able to give up our charter if we want to and secede into the county. I would love to be a part of that process. (Natalie, African American female, age 32)

Collaboration and Conflict

Throughout the school consolidation/unification debate, Tennessee Stand for Children, the state chapter of an education advocacy group with a presence in nine states facilitated local discussions and debates. They did not take a position for or against the merger but participated in panels, and in some cases, organized them, to present experts on school consolidation and education reform. Throughout 2011 and 2012, public meetings, community dialogues, and rallies gave ordinary citizens, parents, and even children a voice in describing the kind of schools they want to attend and the kind of city they want Memphis to become while meeting the needs of all children (Roberts, 2011).

The most vocal opposition to the merger came from the suburbs, especially from David Pickler, chairman of the SCS board. In the year prior to the December 2010 surrender of the MCS charter, Pickler held 36 community meetings in Shelby County for discussions about pursuing a special school district in the suburbs to eliminate the possibility of consolidating city and county school districts. After the MCS charter surrender, Pickler condemned actions taken by the MCS school board as “irresponsible,” thereby blaming MCS for causing divisiveness. He was instrumental in filing a lawsuit to stop the merger and played a prominent role in public debates (McMillin, 2011b).

Some who had opposed the metro government merger joined the opposition to school consolidation, including an anti-government-consolidation group Save Shelby Now (Roberts, 2010). Within the city of Memphis, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), Local 1733, the union that supported the city’s Sanitation Workers Strike in 1968 and invited Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to Memphis, opposed school consolidation just as it had opposed the metro government merger. Both sides, however, used symbolic references to 1968 in their campaigns. The union publicly denounced flyers circulated by merger supporters who used the image of the iconic 1968 “I Am A Man” posters carried by AFSCME sanitation workers to super-impose a “Vote Yes” message for a unified school district (Moore, 2011).

The Quality and Quantity Debates

Along with complaints about the city’s “hostile takeover” of the county schools, much publicly voiced opposition to the school merger centered on debates about the size of the unified school district, that is, increasing the SCS from 47,000 students to 150,000 students, the largest school merger in history, and the quality of education. It was widely believed among Shelby County residents that the SCS district consisted of high-performing schools and students who would be overwhelmed by the addition of large number of low-performing students and schools from MCS. Fears of academic decline, a factor in White flight from the city to the suburbs in the 1970s, gained traction in the push for separate municipal schools (McMillin, 2012). Studies show that residents infer a decline in school quality from the prospects of increasing the percentage of disadvantaged and minority students, supporting the hypothesis that racial composition may be a proxy for lower quality schools (Saporito, 2003). Not surprisingly, questions emerged about whether Shelby County residents would continue well-established practices of abandoning public schools for private schools, or moving to adjacent counties in Tennessee and Mississippi, thereby sustaining patterns of declining public school enrollments that began decades earlier.

Table 1 indicates how public school enrollments differ by race in Memphis (MCS) and Shelby County (SCS) public schools at the time the merger began, and shows comparisons for private school enrollment. It also shows how racial composition changes with a unified county system. The numbers are reported by school districts and individual private schools to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES); they are published as the Common Core of Data and the Private School Universe Survey.

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Table 1.

Percent Enrolled by Race, K-12 2009-2010 School Year.

	Memphis City public schools	Shelby County public schools	Memphis City and Shelby public schools, combined	Shelby county private schools
Black	85.0	37.8	70.6	18.8
White	7.0	52.3	20.9	74.5
Hispanic	6.5	4.6	5.9	1.8
Asian	1.3	4.9	2.4	3.3
Native American	0.1	0.4	0.2	0.1
Hawaiian or Pacific Islander				0.1
Two or more races				1.4
n	109,300	48,211	157,511	13,106
Source. National Center for Education Statistics	Common Core of Data (CCD)			Private School Universe Survey (PSS)

In particular, it shows that public school enrollment in Memphis (MCS) was comprised of a large percentage of Black students (85%), a small White minority (7%), a small Hispanic minority (6.5%), and a very small Asian minority (1.3%). In Shelby County, a majority of students attending MCS public schools were White (52%), and a large minority of public school students were Black (37.8%). The percentage of Hispanic (4.6%) and Asian (4.9%) public students in SCS was larger than MCS. Private school enrollments in all of Shelby County were overwhelmingly White (74.5%) with Black students comprising a minority of private school enrollment (18.8%). The MCS charter surrender and creation of a unified school district create a dramatic change in racial composition for a single school district. For a united SCS, what had been a small majority of White students (52.3%) becomes a large majority of Black students (70.6%), and the percentage of White students drops to 20.9.

Current public and private school enrollments reflect the history of segregation and resistance to desegregation in Memphis. Following the 1954 Supreme Court decision, Brown v. Board of Education, and again after court ordered busing in 1972, school leaders, mayors, and a majority of White Memphians resisted integration, dramatically changing the racial composition of the schools (Sanford, 2011, V1). In 1954, when Brown was decided, the MCS served a student population of 130,000 that was 58% White and 42% Black, primarily in segregated schools (Kiel, 2008). In 1972, few schools were integrated and a federal court order mandated busing 27,000 students to end school segregation. At that time, MCS enrolled 139,000 students—57% were Black, and 42% were White. Since 1972, MCS has lost more than 30,000 students.

Forty years later, many residents of Memphis and Shelby County viewed school unification as a continuation of those historical processes and responded fearfully. Most of the interviewees were aware of the historical conflicts over desegregation and busing and attributed community fears to those past conflicts. Some believed that history of school desegregation and White flight negatively affected the prospects for positive outcomes in 2013.

Of course, history matters. The last time we tried to tie things together didn’t go very well. People thought this was a continuation of that; even though clearly it wasn’t from a policy standpoint, it seemed to be from a spiritual standpoint. Fear of the unknown, misperceptions across lines of geography, lines of race, lines of class . . . And so into that void filled all people’s fears of what the worst possible outcome could have been, as opposed to all people’s hopes of what the best possible outcomes could have been. (Jacob, White male, age 33)

Interviewees clearly understood policy differences between busing and the merger. Some viewed school unification as a continuation of the historic struggle for equality and civil rights. For one leader, this sense of a struggle for equality distinguished the school merger from the failed metro charter merger.

And the other thing is with the schools, it seemed like it was more of an equality proposition. Let’s create—let’s make everybody equal and for some reason, people don’t view [metro] government that way. So it was about the children and it was equal standing for all the children across Shelby County. (Martin, African American male, age 39)

Yet, a different point of view was expressed by someone who was not a parent but believed that suburban residents had the right, that is, local autonomy, to maintain separate school districts and the right to make individual choices benefitting their own children.

I think that the suburban systems have the right to do what they want to do. I mean, it’s part of the great joy of being an American. A company or an executive will take a risk with where they locate their business and where they purchase a home. But the one thing you never risk is what you do with your kids. And you’ll go to great lengths to protect your children and to make sure they have the best. (Connie, White female, age 44)

One single mother, who had moved back to Memphis, first enrolled her ninth-grade son in MCS, but transferred him to a private suburban school the following year. It was a matter of exercising her right to choose and doing what she deemed best for her individual situation.

You know, I have a son who is in private school and he’s there, because I felt that he wasn’t getting—he did one year in high school at a public school here in the city and I didn’t feel that he was being adequately educated. (Tiffany, African American female, age 35)

One father, a strong advocate of public schools, a supporter of the unified district who lives within the MCS district, also exercised his right to choose, albeit reluctantly, citing family history as well as disparities in the allocation of public resources as factors. He clearly understood that boundaries enable and constrain educational opportunities.

My daughter is going to where my wife went, and that’s a private school. And my son is going to go to probably public schools like the ones that I went to, which I know are not indicative and are resource concentrators in much the same way as a school on the other side of a district fence would be. And so that’s a problem too. Of course, the underlying problem is I shouldn’t have to make that decision. I should be able—every school should be—have a high amount of resources. But that’s not the way it is. So, that forces me into a difficult decision. (Jacob, White male, age 33)

One city employee who supported the merger criticized the American culture of individualism. In his view, exercising the individual’s right to choose took place at the expense of fulfilling responsibilities for collective well-being.

Because I think sometimes, I guess within American culture, and that’s one of the things that I don’t like in general, where we might be overly focused on just me being me and my family. But I think we need to balance that with a community mind-set too. (Frank, African American male, age 36)

Invoking the Past: Symbols, Segregation, and Memories

Some interview participants invoked symbols of the civil rights movement to analyze the 21st-century conflict over school consolidation in Memphis. Others recalled their own childhood experiences with busing in the 1970s and 1980s.

It made me sad that I think it boiled down again to race and class, which are many of the issues that divide our community. It seemed very—if it wasn’t, it appeared to be very straight down the line that it was divided between both race and class and how people viewed—it almost seemed antiquated, some of the things people said about, you know, if my children go to school with these children then—it was the same that someone would have said if my—if the black child drinks from the same water fountain, then it’s going to contaminate. It was that same kind of thought process. (Rene, African American female, age 39)

One county resident felt a moral obligation to participate in the unification of school districts. She vividly recalled having been an elementary school student when her parents participated in Citizens Against Busing, held meetings in their home, and switched her from public to private school. Viewing the merger as an opportunity for herself and her community to correct the wrongs of the past, she noted the Biblical significance of 40 years between the busing conflict and school unification.

I’ve always had a heart broken fully from what happened at busing. And the older I got and the more information I got and the stronger my heart became for this city and civil rights and so forth, I thought, halleluiah. I mean, look at the sky opening. We might get to do this again. We might get an opportunity to make this system what it really could be and come together. (Kim, White female, age 44)

A city resident who grew up in a single parent household in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Memphis recalled her experiences of being bused.

And I remember going into the school and parents were taking their kids out and it was a very volatile time in Memphis in the mid ’80s when they started to desegregate some of the suburban schools, which were still I guess Memphis City Schools. Really had a very diverse cultural upbringing for that reason, because we were exposed to a lot of different types of activities and events that we would not have otherwise been exposed to in our neighborhood in North Memphis, which is New Chicago. (Brenda, African American female, age 37)

For others, historical events in the distant past were more salient and more troubling.

And they think that having these people in school with these people will cause a problem. Learning doesn’t know a color. That’s stuff that we’re still in the south and you still got people who don’t understand that the confederacy lost the war and they’re still waving the rebel flags. (Chris, African American male, age 32)

However, the 40-year struggle with desegregation in Shelby County was never far from the minds of most community leaders who wanted political differences between the city and suburbs to disappear. Otherwise, Memphis and Shelby County would reproduce the problems of the past 40 years.

But if we can just step aside and just actually realize we actually pretty much, for the most part, have the same agenda. We want to make sure we’re safe; we want to make sure that our kids are getting educated. Once we get over that, then I think we can work together. But I’m looking forward to the merger. I just hope that the municipal districts can somehow find an opportunity to come together as one. Because otherwise, we’re back in the same boat again. (Rick, African American male, age 30)

Quality of Education

The interviewees strongly reacted to popular assumptions that nearly 60 years after Brown v. Board of Education, and 40 years after desegregation initiatives, significant differences now characterize the quality of education in Shelby County and Memphis. Many questioned not only student performance in both local districts but also the quality of education in the state of Tennessee.

Because the whole municipal movement [for separate schools] is based on this—it’s all based from a sense of falsehoods that, number one, our county school system is a strong, high-performance school system. (Felicia, African American female, age 41)

Some also felt that inequities, misperceptions, and misunderstandings undermined community-building as well as school unification.

The county parents think both that their schools are doing wonderfully and that the city schools are doing horribly and the city schools kind of feel that their perception is from surveys, it always shows up my school is doing fine. The city schools are terrible, and the county schools are wonderful. And the data just doesn’t support any of those things. Your school isn’t fine. The city schools aren’t terrible and the county schools aren’t great. (Jacob, White male, age 33)

One elected city official acknowledged that the SCS district performed better than other school districts in the state of Tennessee, but criticized low expectations as well as performance locally and statewide.

Because the reality was the county school system was doing very well for the state of Tennessee; it was one of the best school systems in the state of Tennessee. But the state of Tennessee had terrible school systems. I mean, that’s like being the valedictorian of summer school. It’s not good enough. (Brad, White male, age 39)

Many community leaders criticized the quality of education in Tennessee schools as well as those in SCS and MCS. And some considered the quality of education in a global context.

So there’s a perception that one is better than the other. And when you look at the statistics, one, the county is outperforming the city schools. Both of them are [showing] improvements statistically. But if you look at it and compare both of them to a global perspective, they’re both underperforming, and in a sense failing our kids. So what are we really debating? (Frank, African American male, age 36)

Segregation: Race, Class, and Immigration

The complications of race and class always emerged in discussions of separate school districts. Most acknowledged racial tensions in debates as well as efforts to avoid open discussion.

Much of this is about race, it is true. It is the truth. And a lot of it is about fear. A lot of it is about change. But a hell of a lot of it is about race. (Natalie, African American female, age 32)

Some viewed the legal battle over unification as a public front for covert racism and classism. Litigation over separate school districts and discussions of so-called but unsubstantiated differences in quality of education permitted people to avoid discussion of race and class, that is, the elephant in the room.

When it comes to [school] unification I don’t mind rich folk wanting to be segregated from poor folk. I don’t mind blacks wanted to be segregated from whites, or vice versa; or Jews wanting to be segregated from Gentiles, or anything like that. As long as we can come together as Memphians peacefully, and as long as what you have is open to me. I’m not saying that I need to participate, but are we peaceful? Can we get along? Can you make your culture accessible to me so that I can understand you better? As opposed to saying I’m going to mask it, I’m going to take it to the Supreme Court, I’m going to be in all the papers and I’m not going to say that the elephant sitting over there is race or socioeconomic segregation. (James, African American male, age 41)

One respondent referred to the silence about race as “polite segregation,” attributing the term to Martin L. King Jr.’s discussion of Birmingham saying that not much had changed. Similarly, a White female questioned suburban fears of busing and redistricting. In her view, opposition to unification made no sense. It had to be covert racism.

I mean, there’s no busing here; is there? Like, they stopped doing that 30 years ago and—so the demographics of the schools wouldn’t change and the fundamental stuff that they like about the schools wouldn’t change. And it’s like, yeah. You’re really afraid of black people, aren’t you? Like, there’s no other way to look at it than you’re the crazy suburban racist. Okay. (Sara, White female, age 27)

A graduate of MCS felt that the unification merger debates had polarized over race and class, and had ignored the needs of the Hispanic community. More open discussions of race, ethnicity, and class would have improved public discussions and helped the transition.

I don’t know. I feel like it could have been better because there was no participation of the [Hispanic] community in itself. And it’s just like other things where some people make the decisions for a lot of other people and it definitely could have been better and I think it’s too soon to tell still. (Marlina, Hispanic female, age 24)

Misperceptions about poverty and wealth in Shelby County, as well as misperceptions about the quality of education, troubled one leader, based on her non-profit organization’s involvement with schoolchildren.

But I saw a neediness in Shelby County schools. So I think there’s this myth that Shelby County schools are affluent and white, because people just don’t know because they don’t walk in the door. So there is this exaggeration that city schools are poor and black, and Shelby County’s white and rich. That’s just not the case. There’s more diversity than that. (Mary, White female, age 50)

An African American man involved with a non-profit organization noted the prevalence of racism in Memphis and Shelby County when he returned to the city after years of living and working away from Tennessee. However, he was encouraged by alliances across racial and class divisions and saw evidence of progress in charter schools.

And yet, more and more and more, I mean people are sick of that [racism]. From both sides of that fence, as it were. And they are proactively moving towards changing that forever. (Reggie, African American male, age 54)

Prospects for Meaningful Change

Some Memphis leaders voiced optimism that public discussion and information about transitioning into a unified school district would lead to better understandings and change people’s minds about the merger.

And so I remain optimistic that this merger is what’s going to force us there. Because what’s also happening is you start peeling the onion and people are starting to see that we really don’t have one great school system and one bad school system. We have two school systems that are not [great]. (Felicia, African American female, age 41)

One man whose work took him across municipal boundaries in Shelby County believed that people would overcome their differences.

You know, when I talk to folks out of the county or in Collierville or Germantown and folks that I admire and look up to, a lot of times they just don’t—they’re not in the same conversation that we might have in the city about the school systems and the mergers and the opportunity there. They don’t see the opportunity; they see it as a problem. And then when we start the conversation and address it as an opportunity, all of a sudden, their minds change. (Rick, African American male, age 30)

However, based on experiences with the merger and resistance to it, several others had become discouraged about the prospects for meaningful change. One community leader expressed disappointment in the unification process, especially the “forced” merger, which, from his perspective, made consensus building unrealistic and unattainable.

You cannot force people to do something they don’t want to do, or be something they don’t want to be. And so it’s going to rip our city apart. As opposed to saying, I accept you; we share this city; how can we make this city better for everybody? That’s what I think we should be doing, instead of saying I’m going to force you to play with that kid you don’t like. No, you’re not. (James, African American male, age 41)

One community leader who had expressed idealism at the time of the charter surrender and optimism about the opportunity for improving the education of all students had gotten discouraged. He was especially discouraged about efforts to create six separate municipal school districts from a unified SCS district.

I’ve given up hope that people will embrace this broad common interests community wide [perspective] and make decisions in that way. I was hopeful up front that that was possible. I’ve given that up. I see that that’s false hope. But my hope now is it will become so practically difficult and then so apparently pointless to continue to enforce that narrower self-interests that over time, that broader self-interests can sort of develop slowly. (Jacob, White male, age 33)

The merger experience had not weakened the enthusiasm of another leader who saw Memphis as facing problems similar to those in other communities. He, too, viewed the process as messy, but worthwhile, and quoted Robert F. Kennedy:

And one of my favorite quotes is one from Robert Kennedy, where he said, “Progress is a nice word, but its root is change. And change has its enemies.” And that’s what we’re talking about with reform, progress; we’re talking about changing the way we do education. Change is going to have its enemies and it’s going to be a messy process. (Brad, White male, age 39)

Durable Inequality

MCS and SCS merged into the Unified School District of Shelby County July 1, 2013, but the merger was short-lived (McMillin, 2011a, 2011b, 2011c). Following a state constitutional amendment permitting special districts after the merger was completed, the municipalities of Arlington, Bartlett, Collierville, Germantown, Lakeland, and Millington voted to establish new districts, and each municipality elected all-White school board members. Anticipating divided school districts operating in 2014, municipalities began hiring superintendents and negotiating with SCS for school buildings and services; therefore, the unified SCS, which absorbed the legacy MCS and legacy SCS, is announcing school closings disproportionately located in the inner city and reallocating resources, including personnel and funding (Dries, 2014). Most observers, including David Pickler, former chair of the SCS board, agree that schools are more segregated today than ever (Pickler, 2013). They may disagree about the motivation for creating separate municipal schools. However, flight from the urban core into suburban enclaves is expected to accelerate, thereby intensifying residential and school segregation, undermining funding for urban schools, protecting funding for suburban schools, and perpetuating systemic and durable inequality.

Paradoxically, the decision to surrender the MCS charter, intended to forestall the creation of separate suburban districts, strengthened separation efforts. In the process of first unifying, then redividing school districts, the categorical distinctions between unequal pairs, for example, city–county, urban–suburban, Black–White, and rich–poor, became more salient. And efforts to maintain social, political, and educational boundaries between these unequal categories relied on old symbols, images, and ideologies of individualism, competition, and local autonomy to reinforce the status quo. The struggle over separate school districts also stirred old fears and misunderstandings about the era of court-mandated busing and civil rights mandates, generating an acrimonious “unification.” These fears and misunderstandings, along with categorical distinctions, served both advantaged (suburban) and disadvantaged (urban) interests in efforts aimed at strategically hoarding their resources and protecting them from would-be competitors. In the end, persistent patterns of segregation and inequality addressed by Brown v. Board of Education continue after 60 years.

Conclusion

Clearly, the debates over metro government and school unification have brought forward new voices and experiences. Among these leaders is a greater awareness of how the organization of government and education matters, although perhaps in ways they had not imagined. Most seem willing to critique public policy and reflect on lessons learned in local campaigns. And supporters as well as opponents of school unification who occupy socially advantaged positions, whether urban or suburban are willing to deploy their own resources, that is, social, cultural, and economic capital, to pursue their own perceived best interests, when public policy initiatives do not produce satisfactory outcomes. Perhaps unwittingly, they too contribute to durable inequality.

Addressing the “deeper and more pervasive elements of inequality,” or “durable inequality,” requires a commitment to change, recognizing that it may be costly. The current climate of economic uncertainty, along with population shifts from urban to suburban communities in Shelby County and across state lines, increases the likelihood that more advantaged residents, in terms of race and class, will work to protect those advantages through the organization of social resources. The separate organizational forms of city–county government and urban–suburban schools rely on competition for public resources on the basis of residence, race, and class, as pretexts for the exclusion of the “other,” thereby maintaining social closure and probably increasing segregation.

The younger generation of leaders in post–civil rights era Memphis faces the educational and economic challenges of the city, county, and metropolitan region with a mixture of idealism and pragmatism. Well-educated and committed to improving educational outcomes for all children in the area, they recognize that working for change may create chaos and unintended consequences, but also creates opportunities for community-building. It remains to be seen whether their efforts can unite a divided Memphis, or whether resistance to change and the costs of change reproduce the status quo in both old and new organizational forms of local government and education.