America Is On The Right Way To Improving Education It All Started With Ruby Bridges

When Ruby Bridges was six years old, she walked up the stairs to her new school. Ruby was scared and people were yelling at her. She spent her first day at her new school in the principal’s office for her own safety. Ruby was one of the first African American children to be put into a school with white children. Ruby had passed an exam to get into the school and ended up graduating from high school and became an advocate for equal rights. She showed America that no matter a person’s race, gender, or religion they should be given the same opportunities as everyone else in public education. Although it was not always this way, America today does provide hope through public education to children of all backgrounds, due to its improvements in access for students with disabilities, females, and students of different nationalities.

Back then not everyone had the equal right to education. It was different for everyone with disabilities, race, religion or if you were a girl or boy. Some cities and towns did not even provide their own schooling which was challenging for many families. In 1647, the court passed a law which was known as the ‘Old Deluder, Satan Act,’ this law required towns of 50 or more families to provide a teacher for all children to learn basic education needed at that time. In 1648, Dedham Massachusetts was the first town to collect “tax support”. Tax support was formed to help individuals pay for their child’s education. This also helps the families with low income that still wanted to provide education for their children. In 1700, they formed 39 middle schools in New England in which students would learn the basics that were necessary back then, which included: Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and literature which were very important to know and helped with communication. When 1779 came around, everything completely changed with education. Thomas Jefferson passed a system for schools that were state sponsored. These state sponsored schools allowed children to go to school, no matter what their religion or gender was. This helped students because they were provided a free education and the basic necessities of learning, such as math, english etc.

Up until the 1930’s, students with disabilities were not included in education. Usually, people with disabilities were put into asylums, or institutions. Most people thought they could not be educated and that they were incapable of learning. During this movement certain groups, events, and people with disabilities wanted a change. The educational system, with the input of the community, ended up forming three acts to help give people suffering with disabilities rights and to make them feel included in our society and provide them with access to the right living environment and schooling. These acts were the “Individuals with Disabilities Education Act” (IDEA). This laws requires that children and youth with disabilities be given ‘a free and appropriate education’ (FAPE) in the ‘least restrictive environment’ (LRE). (Penna 2009) This allowed children to learn despite what their disability was. It was also mandatory that whatever school the individual with a disability attended had to help them and educate them in their areas of need. IDEA also changed how IEPs work. IEP stands for Individualized Education Plan, and it is a specialized plan to help students succeed throughout their school career. There is a team that meets to plan what would be best for the student.

The team consists of: parents, teachers, counselors, specialists and the student. It is also important that the student who has the IEP attends the meeting because they should have the input on their learning and what tools are and are not successful for them. The two other acts that were formed are the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) (Winford 2017). The Rehabilitations Act helps people with disabilities who did not have a lot of money for an education or for a proper environment to live in and to have assistance if needed. Lastly the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) helped show people that even with a disability you should be treated fairly and have the rights and freedom like everyone else. It also helped teachers provide proper education and helpful tools for their students. Overall, these acts were helpful to people with disabilities and also helped educate other individuals who do not have disabilities to see the everyday challenges that individuals with disabilities face.

Girls in education did not have it easy. They had a lot of “morals” to follow, “during the Victorian era, it was widely accepted that women were too physically weak to be able to bear the physical and mental strains of a college education.”(infobase) Some people did not believe that women could handle college. Woman were not taught everything that they were supposed to be taught. They were mostly seen as objects who bear children, clean the house, and cook. Most of the women’s husbands were fighting in the war and the women would stay home and raise the children. Some women did receive an education strictly to learn to read. The only reason they were provided education to read was so the woman could read the bible, which was one of the only things women were able to do and learn back then.

Around the 1930’s, women were taught how to sew and to do other basic necessities for their time period. Woman also did not have the right to vote until the 1920’s, but it was also challenging for women because they were not well educated. Although it was unfortunate that women had to endure these trials and lack of rights, it was because of this that they started The Suffrage Movement. The Suffrage Movement was formed in Seneca Falls, New York around 1848. Women started The Suffrage Movement because they realized that they weren’t being treated properly and that they deserved equal rights. America has come a long way with women’s rights. Now women can even serve on the jury and have the opportunity to work a paying job of their choice. They also have choices for their belief system and the choice to wear what they desire.

African Americans started off being treated very poorly in education. Almost every African American used to wake up in live in fear in the 1800’s, because most of them in the South were slaves. Some people wanted to give African Americans an education so that they were able to do the skills that they were told to do. Some of the white people wanted to teach the African Americans how to read so they could read the bible. However, most people did not want African American to get an education. The slaves that did try and have a proper education would be faced with a brutal punishment for them trying learn. However, there were some people who felt bad for African Americans and slaves and tried to educate them as much as possible, sometimes teaching them to read or learn basic math. Around the start of the civil war, “only about 5 percent of the slave population was literate”. (Altman 2000) Often black people thought they were not good enough and didn’t need to learn cause all they did is work for the whites. They were also did not think they had a need to learn in society because all they knew was to work for the white people.

After the Civil War, there was an plan to provide millions of freed slaves with an education. A law was passed, called “The Freedmen’s Bureau, which was established to help the newly liberated slaves, made education a primary consideration. In five years, it spent $5,000,000 building 4,329 schools and hiring 10,000 teachers. Over 247,333 African Americans rushed to take advantage of the educational opportunities being offered them.” (Altman 2000)

In 1867, African Americans gained enough political power that they were able to help pass a law to help with the education Now the schooling for African Americans was supported by tax dollars and is opened to all races. This was formed in Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. (Altman 2000) This gave every child hope for education and not having to be a slave and be able to receive the same rights as a white person. The religious freedom was very limited of what you could believe in. They were very strict on individuals reading the bible. Most the Europeans came to America for more religious freedom but everyone who was in the school systems in America at that time had to learn about religion even if it was not their own. Even though tax dollars went to fund public schools, they were still segregated by race. It wasn’t until 1954 that segregation was stopped.

A case called “Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, would be one of the most important in Supreme Court history. It began when Oliver Brown was refused permission to enroll his eight-year-old child, Linda, in a white school in Topeka, Kansas. The case was filed on February 28, 1951, in the U.S. District Court for Kansas.” (Altman 2000) The Supreme Court ruled in favor of desegregation, and “schools systems across the nation that they would have to integrate. But it did not say how and it did not say when. Fifty-four weeks after its initial decision, the Court issued a decree (generally referred to as ‘Brown II’) indicating just how school desegregation should proceed. Some school districts did not wait for instructions. Washington, D.C., moved to integrate its system completely at the beginning of the new fall term.” (Altman 2000)

There are also some individuals that don’t believe in access to a fair education. Some people believe that a child with special needs should be moved to a separate school. The reason being is that they are a “distraction” for the other children. Many men also believed that woman did not need to learn and should be home. They thought that the only thing that they could do is cook, clean and take care of their husbands. Testing is a concern for parents now because you need to pass the MCAS to receive your diploma. Parents do not like this because everyone gets the same test and it is not fair to the children that are challenged.

In conclusion I believe that America does provide hope for the future education in America. I do believe it has gotten alot better and has improved. Today we proudly can say we accept any gender, race or religion in our schools. It is learning environment to help are kids and to grow to pass this onto their generation to come. America is in the right steps to improve are education it all started with Ruby Bridges.

Works Cited

Altman, Susan. “African-American Education.” Encyclopedia of African-American Heritage, Second Edition, Facts On File, 2000. History, online.infobase.com/Auth/Index?aid=153349&itemid=WE52&articleId=159351. Accessed 22 May 2018.
D’Andrea-Penna, Vickie, and David Penna. “Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).” Encyclopedia of American Disability History, Facts On File, 2009. History, online.infobase.com/Auth/Index?aid=153349&itemid=WE52&articleId=211087. Accessed 21 May 2018
Winford, Clenton G. “Civil Rights of People with Disabilities.” Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court, Facts On File, 2005. History, online.infobase.com/Auth/Index?aid=153349&itemid=WE52&articleId=410842. Accessed 21 May 2018.