CNN —A few weeks ago, I gave the keynote speech at an inaugural conference on Black literacy exploring what the organizers called an “alarming literacy gap” between Black students and their peers. The White students even had their prom at the local country club while the Black students’ prom was held in the school gym. And since schools with high numbers of poor Black and Brown students tend to be drastically underfunded the correlation between poverty and lower academic achievement is hardly surprising. More than two-thirds attend schools in which only a minority of students are eligible for FRPL, schools where better funding and opportunities mean better outcomes. Research shows that integration raises the attainment levels of all students — not just those who are Black, Brown and poor.

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Persons: Keith Magee, Keith Magee Arron Dunworth, sleepovers, Angela Davis, Brown, backpedaling, —, Martin Luther King, Jr, Beverly Daniel Tatum, ” Organizations: University College London Institute for Innovation, Newcastle University Law School, CNN, of Education of, Civil Rights, Stanford, University of Southern, Pacific, Research, Twitter, Facebook, Brown v, of Education Locations: America, Brown, of Education of Topeka, Louisiana, University of Southern California, Black