1. The Civil Rights Movement Education

2. Aims: Examine how the Civil Rights campaign led to changes in education.

3. One of the first major events in the Civil Rights Movement was over education. Twenty states in the USA, all in the South, had segregated schools Schools for Black children were much worse. Therefore Black children were denied the same opportunities as Whites.

4. Division In Education

5. Brown v the Topeka Board of Education In 1951, Linda Brown was an eight year old Black girl. She had to walk a great distance to school as she was banned for attending the school near to where she lived. The school she attended was much worse than her local one. Her father challenged this discrimination and took the Topeka School Board to Court. They were supported by the NAACP – National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People. The NAACP was setup in 1909 and campaigned for equality for coloured people

6. The case was taken to the Supreme Court in America, where the Browns were successful. In 1954 the Supreme Court ordered that schools should be desegregated. This was an important victory – if segregation in education was illegal, the next step was that segregation in other areas should also be made illegal. In 1955 the Supreme Court ordered that schools should be desegregated as fast as possible. By the end of 1956, not one black child attended a white school in the South.

7. Tasks Read pages 63-64 and complete Activities 1-3 on page 64. Read page 65 and complete Activities 1-3 on page 65.

8. Little Rock, Arkansas 1957 This was the most famous struggle to integrate schools in the USA. Central High School in Little Rock decided it would take nine Black students on Sept 3 rd, 1957. The Governor, Orval Faubus sent state soldiers to surround the school and prevent this from happening. An angry white mob also gathered outside the school.

9. Little Rock, Arkansas 1957 Elizabeth Eckford, aged 15 was one of the first students to arrive. The National Guard prevented her from entering the school and she was chased down the street by an angry white mob. The President, Dwight Eisenhower was no longer willing to have states ignoring federal law. The Governor was ordered to remove the state soldiers and 1000 US soldiers were sent to protect Black children at Little Rock. The troops stayed for a year and patrolled the school corridors.

10. Tasks Using your workguide pages 66-67 and the information from this powerpoint, write a detailed paragraph describing the events in Little Rock Arkansas in 1957.