A third-grader from St. Louis was told he couldn’t return to his elementary school next year—because he’s black.
Edmund Lee’s family will be moving from inside St. Louis city limits to a new suburban school district and, when they asked if the boy could still attend his school after the move, they were refused due to a twisted application of a decades-old state desegregation law forbidding black students from going to city schools.
“It was surprising to me to have on a piece of paper that he couldn’t attend because he was an African American and if he was another race he could,” LaShieka White, Edmond’s mother, told the Daily News.
The 1980 U.S. Court of Appeals law that will prevent Edmond, 9, from returning to the city charter school, Gateway Science Academy, was created with good intentions.
The desegregation law was supposed to diversify both the city schools, which were in poor condition and predominantly black, as well as the suburban schools, in better condition and predominantly white.
But in the case of Edmond’s school, which is roughly 80 percent white, this particular application of the law will actually have the inverse effect by barring a black student.
St. Louis student can't return to school because he's black - NY Daily News
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