A national report cites the Talladega County School System for aiding integration by complying with a choice provision in the No Child Left Behind Act.The report was published this month by Citizens Commission on Civil Rights following its national study on school transfers under the No Child Left Behind Act.
The NCLB gives parents the right to transfer their children out of schools that are designated “in need of improvement” to other public schools that are performing better, and providing better educational opportunities for poor and minority students.
Talladega County Schools Superintendent Cindy Elsberry said Talladega County Central High is the only school in the system designated as “in need of improvement.”
Students who live in the TCCHS school district may choose to attend Childersburg, Lincoln or Winterboro, depending on where they live, Elsberry said.
While Brown v. Board of Education ended racial segregation in public schools, students still are often segregated because of poverty, Elsberry said.
“Poverty is a strong indicator of poor academic achievement,” she said, adding that there are more African-American families living in poverty than white families.
The CCCR’s 130-page report, titled Choosing Better Schools, states that the Talladega County School System had 28 of 306 eligible students request transfers out of Talladega County Central High during the 2003-2004 school year.
That number represents about 9 percent of the students eligible to transfer.
Of the 28 students who transferred, 95 percent were minorities and 82 percent were from low-income families.
The percentage of minority students in the receiving schools is 37 to 61 percent. The percentage of low-income students in the receiving schools is 45 to 73 percent, the study states.
Moody Scroggins, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, said letters have already gone out this year to notify the parents of sixth- through 11th-grade students of their choice to allow their children to attend Talladega Central High or another school.
“We had more students this year than ever to ask for a transfer,” Scroggins said.
To remove the transportation barrier, the law mandates that schools provide transportation to any student who requests a transfer. Scroggins said the extra bus route is paid for with federal funds.
Parents who want their child to remain at TCCHS may choose extra tutoring for the child provided by organizations outside the School System. The tutoring is also paid with federal funds, Scroggins said.
While the CCCR report states that some receiving schools in other districts across the nation have had to turn away transfers due to overcrowding, Scroggins said that is not the case with Talladega County students.
“We’ve never had a receiving school not take a student for lack of room,” he said.
The Talladega County School System is one of five systems in Alabama in compliance with the provision, the report states.
The report states NCLB school choice is helping to promote racial and economic diversity in a significant number of school districts and is having a desegregative effect in Alabama and South Carolina.
