“THE CONSENT DECREE WAS NOT THE END, BUT THE BEGINNING:” A PORTRAIT OF THE CHAMPAIGN COMMUNITY UNIT DISTRICT NO. 4
“In Unit 4, we are committed to the success of all students. We believe that high expectations for students, learning environments that support equity and excellence, continuous monitoring of
student performance and high levels of accountability will ensure exemplary achievement by every student” (District Handbook, p. 23, 2011).
In this chapter, I provide a brief history of the origins of Unit 4 and racial equity and race relations in the local community and the schools. Further, I detail some of the events that lead to the establishment of an equity consent decree to serve as a vehicle for implementing and
monitoring efforts introduced in the school district to address racial disparities in educational policies and practices. I also present enrollment data over a number of years to demonstrate trends in African American student participation in honors and AP classes. This chapter concludes with a discussion of the post-consent decree climate. Information presented in this chapter provides a historical and contemporary context for students’ attitudes toward academic placement and the equity reform efforts implemented to remedy racial disparities between African American and White students in upper level classes.
Champaign, IL
Known for its rich, black, fertile soil and flat land, ideal for easy farming and a great harvest, and the experience of all four seasons (winter, spring, summer, and fall), Champaign, Illinois is the larger half of a twin, micro-urban city.13 One hundred thirty-five (135) miles south of Chicago and 124 miles west of Indianapolis, IN, Champaign is home to a world-class
university, the University of Illinois, and several offices of Fortune 500 companies. Surrounded
by farm communities and corn and soybean fields, and neighboring towns such as, Danville, Mahomet, Rantoul, Savoy, and Urbana, West Urbana was founded in 1854 and later renamed Champaign in 1861. Once a small town with just “a train deport, steam mill, stores, a church, and a post office” (McGinty, 2007), Champaign has grown into a college town with a vibrant
downtown nightlife of bars and breweries, a diverse selection of restaurants, entertainment venues, such as the Virginia Theater, shopping centers, like the Marketplace Mall, a number of annual festivals, including the Taste of Champaign,14 and several elementary and secondary schools, parks and playgrounds, a petting zoo, and the popular, Sholem Pool and Waterworks Waterslide, located on the west side of the city.
According to the US Census Estimate (2012), Champaign had a population of 82,517. The population was majority White, 64.8%, followed by Black/African American, 15.4%, Asian, 10.5%, Hispanic/Latino, 6.3%, Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, 0.07%, Native American, 0.2%, and Multi-racial/Ethnic, 2.5%. The University of Illinois, Champaign Community Unit District No. 4, Kraft, and Parkland College are the top employers in the city. In 2012, the median family household income was $68,868, and 33% of Champaign residents were living in poverty (US Census Estimate, 2012). Politically, the current mayor is a Democrat, but the previous mayor was a tea-party15 Republican and served three terms. The majority of Champaign
registered voters have supported the Democratic Party candidate during the last five presidential elections.
Housing patterns trend towards African Americans, by and large, living in the area north of University Avenue, west of Wright Street, bordered by the interstate on the north, as a result
14 The Taste of Champaign is a local spinoff of the famous Taste of Chicago held annually in Grant Park in Chicago,
Illinois.
15The tea party is the ultra conservative, far right wing of the Republican Party, which emerged as a spark in
of de facto neighborhood segregation, including real estate practices. Most working-poor Latinos live “at a trailer park on the north-east end of town, the historical African American
neighborhood,” and others live “at another low-income neighborhood behind a major strip mall on the north-west side of the city” (Cruz, 2005, p. 47). College students live throughout the town, but mostly concentrated in residence halls, houses, and apartments close to the university
campus, and university faculty and staff live mostly in middle-class neighborhoods (Cruz, 2005).
The University of Illinois
For many persons, the University “IS” Champaign and Champaign “IS” the University; they are directly associated. In fact, for many students, their only association with Champaign is the campus, and folks not from the area often immediately reference the University when asked about the city. This is often the case, in part, because it is THE main attraction to the area, and the campus is very large, and includes many features of a town, such as several restaurants, shopping stores, banks, medical center, gas stations, nightclubs and bars, exercise facilities, residence halls, apartments, hotels, entertainment centers, 24 hour veterinary medical hospital, and even a golf course and airport as part of the campus extension. Therefore, a discussion of Champaign, as a city, cannot be complete without a more in depth reference to the University of Illinois.
The University of Illinois is a public land-grant institution established in 1867 and renamed in 1885, spanning areas of Urbana and Champaign. A Tier I research, world-class university, in its 2014 rankings, U.S. News & World Report’s America’s Best Colleges rated Illinois the number 11 public university. The Graduate School of Library and Information Science, The College of Engineering, The College of Business, and The College of Education are ranked among the top graduate and undergraduate programs in the nation. The University is
also ranked #1 most “disability friendly” US campuses. Home to one of the largest public university libraries in the world, Illinois is comprised of 17 colleges and instructional units, 4 cultural centers, 23 undergraduate university residence halls, more than 1,000 registered student organizations, and one of the largest Greek-letter communities in the nation.
Illinois is a Big 10, NCAA Division I, Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC) University with more than 425,000 living alumni, including Nobel Peace Prize winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, actors, college presidents, founders of websites, like YouTube and PayPal, and enterprises, like Playboy. In fall 2013, the University population consisted of more than 40,000 students, including 32,294 undergraduate and 10,080 graduate, and 1,024 professional students, and 2,500 faculty members. The student body is 55% men and 45% women, 50% Caucasian, 5% African American, 7.2% Latino/a, 13% Asian American, <1% Native American, 2.2%
Multiracial, and 22% International.
The University of Illinois is a system of universities and has campuses in Chicago and Springfield, Illinois; the Urbana-Champaign campus is the flagship campus. A Board of Trustees governs the system, a President provides leadership for all three campuses, and each campus has its own Chancellor. The Chancellor of the Urbana-Champaign campus also serves as the Vice- President of the system. In-state undergraduate and graduate tuition is approximately $15,000 per year, while out-of-state tuition is about $30,000 per year.
Although at times experiencing a contentious town-gown relationship with the occasional reference from a university student referring to a local resident as a “townie,” the city of
Champaign and the University of Illinois do have a rather deep connection. This connection is visible at athletic events in Memorial Stadium or Assembly Hall, cheering on the Fighting Illini, local worship services in which students are often provided transportation to and from, campus
or community programs featuring renowned speakers and/or musical artists, and conscious elevating events, like Speak Café, an open forum for self-expression through various forms of art, including poetry, song, and dance. Academically, the university has been awarded a number of research grants to carry out projects in the local community, and departments on campus have established partnerships with the local schools. For example, the Center for Education in Small Urban Communities in the College of Education conducts professional development workshops and consulting for area teachers. The university also facilitates programs and initiatives which include, but are not limited to, TRIO Upward Bound, TRIO Educational Talent Search, AP Scholar’s Summer Academy, The Chancellor’s Academy for local teachers, Martin Luther King, Jr. Essay Contest, and the Youth Literature Festival. Faculty and students have also created spaces, such as Saving Our Lives Hear Our Truths (SOLHOT) and Urban Reality (UR) Movement, to engage members of the local community. Registered student clubs and
organizations have also engaged in the local community through volunteer work at shelters and soup kitchens, neighborhood clean up projects, reviewing high school students’ personal statements for college, mentoring students in Unit 4, and providing tutorial services. At times, students have self-engaged in local politics and social justice actions, such as standing up for community violence and racial profiling by police officers, registering community members to be eligible to vote, and protesting a racists mural displayed in the downtown area, among other actions.
As it directly relates to this study, the University also played various roles in assisting Unit 4 and the local community in addressing racial disparities in the local schools identified under the consent decree and providing expert advice about school climate. For example, faculty members were asked to serve on various monitoring committees for the school district,
participate in community forums, and provide professional development for teachers and administrators. Additionally, Dr. Mark Aber, Professor of Psychology at the University of Illinois, and his team were selected to conduct two climate studies for Unit 4 and offer recommendations on how to improve the school climate.
Unit 4
Champaign Community Unit District No. 4 is the public school system for the city of Champaign and an additional 80 square miles of rural territory. In 1855, Illinois state legislation was passed to orchestrate statewide public schools systems. Public schools erupted shortly thereafter in West Urbana, Illinois (presently known as Champaign, Illinois), and were separated into two school districts, District 1 and District 2. In 1890, the two school districts reorganized into a single district, Union District No. 6. The district was renamed Champaign District 71 in 1901. “After World War II, the state legislature took measures to encourage the reorganization of school districts into more efficient operating units. Champaign District 71 and twelve former one-room districts in the surrounding area were consolidated into Community Unit District No. 4 in 1948.” Over the years, schools in Community Unit District No. 4 (Unit 4) have been closed, reopened, and reorganized for different purposes. The Board of Education, Superintendent, and Administrative staff govern the district. Today, Unit 4 consists of an early childhood center, 11 elementary schools, 3 middle schools, 3 high schools, and an Academic Academy serving more than 9,000 students. Racially, the student body in Unit 4 is 41.2% White, 34.9% African
American, 8.8% Latino/a, 9.7% Asian, 0.1% Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, 0.3% Native American, and 5% Multi racial/Ethnic (Illinois School Report Card, 2012). Unit 4 has 704 teachers, primarily White (84%) and female (75%). The average teaching salary in the school district is $55,185. Other demographics for Unit 4 are illustrated in Figure 4.1.
Figure 4.1 Unit 4 Demographics
Since this study focuses on high school students’ attitudes toward placement, I will further describe Unit 4 high schools. Unit 4 has three high schools, Novak Academy16, Champaign Centennial High School (Centennial), and Champaign Central High School
(Central).17 Novak Academy, a small alternative high school, was opened in fall 2008, to meet the needs of non-traditional students by offering smaller class sizes, individualized learning plans to accommodate different skill levels, and online and project-based courses among other
resources. Students at Novak Academy (N=29) participated in the 2009 climate survey used in this study. However, their responses were not included in this study given the nature and design
16 Formerly Academic Academy
17 Unit 4 has also established the READY Program, which is for students, grade 6-12, with multiple suspensions and
expulsions for misconduct. Some students attend READY for the full day while others attend for half a day and then their regularly enrolled school for the other half.
20.9 24.5 6 55.9 93.6 16.7 6.1 3.9 81.4 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Average Composite ACT Average Class Size Limited English Proficiency Low Income Households Attendance Rate Mobility Rate Chronic Truancy Rate Drop out Rate Graduation Rate
of the school18. Centennial and Central both have traditional systems of academic placement with different levels of curricula (AP, honors, academic, etc.).
Central is the older of the two high schools with a history dating back to its founding in 1870 as West Side High School and later Avenue Grade School and then Champaign High School. In SY1964 (Read: School Year 1963-64), due to overcrowding at Champaign High School, now Champaign Central High School, several students were assigned to attend half of their classes at the high school and the other half at a local middle school, Jefferson. Two academic years later, SY1966, Unit 4 built a new structure next to the middle school, Senior High School Annex, to better accommodate the overcrowding of students, originally just for a selection of sophomores, but later the addition of an equal distribution of sophomores, juniors, and seniors in SY1967. The students at the Annex attended their full day of classes on site and on the same schedule as those at Champaign High School. In SY1967, Champaign High School was renamed Champaign Central High School, “Central,” and the Annex, Champaign Centennial High School, “Centennial.” The school district adopted a policy to add freshmen to the high schools in SY1978.
In 2012, Central High School had an enrollment of 1,307 students—43.8% White, 36% Black, 8.7% Latino/a, 7.7% Asian, 0.1% Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, 0.5% Native
American, and 3.1% Multi racial/Ethnic (Illinois School Report Card, 2012). Central, a two-time recipient of the US Department of Education “Excellence in Education Award,” has a school day spanning from 8:05am to 3:20pm, several course offerings, including honors and advanced placement, athletic teams, such as boys and girls basketball and cross country, an award winning marching band, a school newspaper, the Chronicle, and several student clubs and organizations,
like the African American Club, Thespians, and Color Guard. Central’s juniors and seniors are permitted to leave campus for a 50-minute lunch break. Freshmen and sophomores split their lunch period with a supervised study hall. Academically, in SY2012, 17.3%, 12.7%, and 14.5% of Blacks were reported as meeting or exceeding academic standards in reading, mathematics, and science, respectively, as determined by the Prairie State Achievement Examination (PSAE) administered to students in Grade 11. Conversely, 65.1%, 64.4%, and 67.8% of Whites were reported as meeting or exceeding academic standards in reading, mathematics, and science, respectively, on the PSAE. According to federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB)
specifications, Central did not make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) in reading or, mathematics in SY2012. Other demographics for Central are presented in Figure 4.2.
Figure 4.2 Unit 4 demographics, by high school
In 2012, Centennial High School had an enrollment of 1,459 students—48.4% White, 33.9% Black, 6% Latino/a, 8.2% Asian, 0.1% Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, 0.2% Native
21 24.4 4.7 52.9 17.1 4 80.1 20.8 24.6 1 47.4 17.7 3.9 82.4 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
Average Composite ACT Average Class Size Limited English Proficiency Low Income Households Chronic Truancy Rate Drop out Rate Graduation Rate
Centennial Central
American, and 3.2% Multi racial/Ethnic (Illinois School Report Card, 2012). The Centennial school day commences at 8:10am, a few minutes later than Central. Unlike Central, Centennial has Illinois High School Association (IHSA) teams such as fishing, baseball, and bowling. Centennial has a number of course offerings for students at different levels of challenge, including foreign languages, as well as several clubs and organizations for students to become involved, such as the Gay-Straight Alliance, WYSE (World wide youth in Science &
Engineering), and the African American Culture Club. The Centinal is the school newspaper. Juniors and seniors are permitted to leave campus for their open lunch period, similar to the students at Central, and they are also allowed to register a vehicle and receive a student-parking permit—a privilege not extended to the students at Central due to availability of parking in the area near the school. Similar to Central, bus service is provided for students who live 1½ miles or more from the school and where public transportation is not available. A large number of students rely on Champaign-Urbana Mass Transit District (MTD) for transportation to and from school. Academically, in SY2012, 20%, 21.1%, and 22.2% of Blacks either met or exceeded academic standards in reading, mathematics, and science, respectively, on the PSAE, compared to 66.9%, 67%, 66.5% of Whites meeting or exceeding academic standards in the same areas, respectively. Centennial also did not meet AYP in reading and mathematics in SY2012. Other demographics for Centennial are presented above in Figure 4.2.
Race Relations and the Fight for Equal Educational Opportunities
“African-Americans have been a visible and active presence here [Champaign-Urbana] for most of the towns’ histories,” beginning with the black migration “with the completion of the north-south railroad in the 1950s,” writes Jonathan Sterne in the essay “Scratch Me, and I Bleed Champaign: Geography, Poverty and Politics in the Heart of East Central Illinois” (2004). “Run
out of money” or “taking jobs along the way to Chicago” were common reasons for early settling in the area by Blacks, according to Jane Andrews Cromwell, as reported in Sterne (2004). Early black settlers lived in various parts of the city according to an 1878 survey, but by 1904, they were concentrated in the northeast area of Champaign primarily because, in part, federally
funded public housing (and post-World War II housing) existed there, and the rent was low—and they had lower waged jobs—and “explicit segregation policies kept them there” (Sterne, 2004).
In “Reform in the Black Power Era,” Joy Ann Williamson Lott (2009) states,
“Champaign, Illinois, was a southern town in its attitude toward and treatment of black residents well into the twentieth century” (p. 307). Like other towns and cities in the south, north, and Midwest, Champaign was segregated and discrimination against Blacks was ever present (Sterne, 2004). Until the early 1960s, Black residents were denied counter space at local diners, access to hotels, barbershops, and residential property in non-Black racially identifiable
neighborhoods, and were relegated to “Negro-only” sections at the local theater and other community spaces (Sterne, 2004). Blacks were also denied employment as bank tellers, sales clerks, and secretaries among other positions, and thus many found employment through the University of Illinois’ fraternities and sororities and other service jobs (Sterne, 2004). Black owned businesses, such as restaurants, barbershops, nightclubs and pool halls, did exist in the northeast area of the city to accommodate for many of the services they were denied by white- owned establishments (Jefferson, 2010). However, due to red lining (practice of denying or charging more for financial services), many of these businesses ended since the Black business owners were unable to secure loans for development and expansion (Jefferson, 2010).
The University
Similar acts of discrimination were also occurring at the University of Illinois during those times, to which the first black student was admitted in 1887. Black students, who at the