Brittany Schultz

April 10, 2015

EDU 218 B
Brown v. Board of Education Summary
The case of Brown v. Board of Education took place in 1951 at the
District Court level. The case requested that racial segregation be ended for
black and white students in schools. Thirteen parents brought this to court
for their twenty students, but also for all of the other students who had been
psychologically impacted by segregated schools.1 The case used the name of
Oliver L. Brown, a parent who was fighting for his daughters right to attend a
white school closer to their home. The lawyers thought that the case being
named after a person dealing with the issue would make it more personal. 2 In
the District Court of Kansas, this case lost. This case, however, was taken to
the Federal Court to be reviewed with four other cases that had similar
arguments. The case was heard twice by the Supreme Court, once in the
spring of 1953 and once in the fall of 1953. Finally, the Supreme Court
justices made a unanimous decision in favor of Brown.
Race is still an issue in schools today, with an imbalance of races in the
schools throughout the country.3 In many schools you can find a majority of
whites or a majority of blacks. Rarely is there an even mixture between all
1 En.wikipedia.org
2 En.wikipedia.org
3 Theatlantic.com

races. There is not an equal opportunity for learning nor is there for going to
good schools. Often, schools with lower academic scores will be in bad
neighborhoods and have a majority of black students, whereas in private
schools, there tends to be more white students. Segregation of schools still
happens, it is just defined and organized differently. Brown v. Board of
Education made an impact in 1953, but something else needs to be done for
the students in schools today.