GALVESTON — A federal judge will allow a new plaintiff into a 50-year-old federal desegregation lawsuit against the Galveston public school district, postponing a federal judge’s order to declare the district desegregated for at least another month.
Judge Sim Lake ruled that attorney Anthony Griffin can substitute one of four proposed plaintiffs in the lawsuit. Of the four, only one — an African-American student enrolled in special education classes — represented the interests of the original African-American plaintiffs, whose attorneys are no longer living. Lake will not allow the substitution of three other plaintiffs, including one white student and two Hispanic students.
The district has opposed the substitution of any plaintiffs, saying the proposed plaintiffs had no legal right to intervene.
In his ruling, Lake said it was the court’s goal to achieve final unitary status — or a formal declaration of desegregation — for the district by the end of the 2008-09 school year.
Determining Factors
A judge considers eight factors when determining whether a district is ready to be declared desegregated in the eyes of the federal government: student assignment, faculty and staff assignments, pupil transportation, extracurricular activities, facilities, allocation of resources, student achievement and special programs.
After turning over all what the district all necessary information to reach unitary status, the U.S. Department of Justice asked for additional information including:
• Information about enrollment by race/ethnicity in Ball High School’s advanced placement classes and the gifted and talented classes in the district’s elementary and middle schools.
• Evidence that the district does not assign teachers or staff members to a school so that the racial composition of that school indicates the school is intended for white, black or Hispanic students.
• Information about the spike in the percentage of disciplinary incidents attributed to African-American students between 2002-03 and 2003-04 school years.
• Evidence that the district intends to state explicitly in its policies and procedures that it will not consider race as a factor for any extracurricular activities, including superlative categories in a school yearbook such as choice for the “blondest” students.
That category, in the 2006-07 Weis Middle School yearbook, has since been removed.
The justice department believes the district is desegregated in its transportation and facilities, the court’s ruling states.
The district responded a month later in August with the requested information.
‘Good-faith Effort’
According to the district’s filing, the district “has made and continues to make a good-faith effort to remedy previous de jure segregation in its schools.”
In response to the justice department’s questions, the district said:
• All advanced placement and gifted and talented courses are open enrollment for anyone meeting the academic requirements, regardless of race or ethnicity. The number of minority students taking advanced classes, while disproportionately low across the nation, is increasing, the district argued.
• The district has worked aggressively to ensure each school is staffed with a diverse faculty but has been hesitant to reassign teachers in order to create more diverse faculties because of the discontent reassignment breeds. The district has stepped up its minority recruitment efforts.
• The spike of disciplinary incidents may be attributable to incorrect data input in years before 2003-04 and differences in how disciplinary incidents are recorded.
The district once again asked the court to consider giving it unitary status. Griffin has until Nov. 7 to respond.
The Galveston school district is one of only a handful in the state still under a federal order to desegregate.
A declaration of unitary status would not only help the community heal and move forward, it could also restore trust and confidence in the district, Superintendent Lynne Cleveland has said.
The ruling would also remove the district from judicial scrutiny, Cleveland said. Once it achieves unitary status, the district will no longer have to ask the court’s permission to rezone or close schools.
