In Charlotte, the site of a groundbreaking Supreme Court case that led to three decades of busing to ensure racial balance, schools have spent much of the past several years resegregating after getting federal court approval to allow parents more choice of where to send their kids.
At Beverly Woods Elementary, just north of the Quail Hollow Country Club that hosts a namesake PGA Tour event, 79 percent of the students are White. A few miles up the road, at Montclaire Elementary, only 4 percent of the students—just 19 out of 450—are White.
There are no plans in Charlotte to revisit busing. Pamela Grundy, a parent in Charlotte who has decried the divisions within the school district, said leaders in Raleigh should take notice.
“The lesson of Charlotte is that desegregation will go away so quickly. Once you lose it, you can't get it back,” she said.
