AACTE 2023 Gloria J. Ladson-Billings Outstanding Book Award
Jim Crow's Pink Slip exposes the decades-long repercussions of a
too-little-known result of resistance to the Brown v. Board of
Education decision: the systematic dismissal of Black educators from
public schools.
In 1954, the Supreme Court's Brown decision ended segregated schooling
in the United States, but regrettably, as documented in congressional
testimony and transcripts, it also ended the careers of a generation of
highly qualified and credentialed Black teachers and principals. In the
Deep South and northern border states over the decades following
Brown, Black schools were illegally closed and Black educators were
displaced en masse. As educational policy and leadership expert Leslie
T. Fenwick deftly demonstrates, the effects of these changes stand
contrary to the democratic ideals of an integrated society and equal
educational opportunity for all students.
Jim Crow's Pink Slip provides a trenchant account of how tremendous
the loss to the US educational system was and continues to be. Despite
efforts of the NAACP and other civil rights organizations, congressional
hearings during the Nixon administration, and antiracist activism of the
21st century, the problems fomented after Brown persist. The book
draws the line from the past injustices to problems that the educational
system grapples with today: not simply the underrepresentation of Black
teachers and principals, but also salary reductions, teacher shortages,
and systemic inequality.
By engaging with the complicated legacy of the Brown decision, Fenwick
illuminates a crucial chapter in education history. She also offers
policy prescriptions aimed at correcting the course of US education,
supporting educators, and improving workforce quality and diversity.
