YESTERDAY, TODAY, AND TOMORROW

Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow provides a compelling analysis of the forces and choices that have shaped the trend toward the resegregation of public schools. By assembling a wide range of contributors - historians, sociologists, economists, and education scholars - the editors provide a comprehensive view of a communitys experience with desegregation and economic development. Here we see resegregation through the lens of Charlotte, North Carolina, once a national model of successfuldesegregation, and home of the landmark Swann desegregation case, which gave rise to school busing. This book recounts the last forty years of Charlottesdesegregation and resegregation, putting education reform in a political and economic context. Within a decade of the Swann case, the district had developed one of the nations most successful desegregation plans, measured by racial balance and improved academic outcomes for both black and white students. However, beginning in the 1990s, this plan was gradually dismantled. Today, the level of resegregation in Charlotte has almost returned to what it was prior to 1971. At the core of Charlottes story is the relationship between social structure and human agency, with an emphasis on how yesterdays decisions and actions define todays choices.