Unfortunately, this is not the reality for too many students. While COVID-19 has crippled our country’s public education system even further, America’s schools were deeply segregated and inequitable long before the pandemic. Poor children and children of color are likely to already be behind their wealthier and white peers when they start school, and as they progress through schools with smaller budgets and fewer educational resources, it is too often impossible to catch up.

• Less than half of children born into household and neighborhood poverty are ready for school at age five compared with 78 percent of their wealthier peers.
• More than 75 percent of lower-income fourth and eighth grade public school students were not proficient in reading or math in 2019, compared with less than 50 percent of higher-income fourth grade and less than 55 percent of higher-income eighth grade students (see Table 21).
• More than 77 percent of Hispanic and more than 79 percent of Black fourth and eighth grade public school students were not proficient in reading or math in 2019 compared with less than 60 percent of white students (see Tables 22-23).
• During the 2017-2018 school year, 19 percent of Black, 21 percent of Hispanic, and more than 26 percent of American Indian/Alaska Native public school students did not graduate on time compared with only 11 percent of white students (see Table 24).

Students of color in schools that are highly segregated along racial and economic lines have significantly less access to highly-qualified and experienced teachers and high-quality educational resources. Academic indicators such as standardized test scores and graduation rates indicate that learning suffers accordingly.

• Only 1 in 8 white students attends a school where the majority of students are Black, Hispanic, Asian, or American Indian, whereas nearly 7 in 10 Black children attend such schools.
• Every school district in the U.S. where segregation is high or even moderate has a large achievement gap.
• In 2017, 60 percent of Black children attended high-poverty schools with a high share of students of color while fewer than 9 percent of white children did.

Large disparities in school funding mean that children living in lower-wealth areas—often children of color and children growing up in poverty—also attend under-funded schools that have fewer high-quality teachers, fewer curricular resources, larger class sizes, and less student support.

When we deny our children the education to which they have every right, we deny them the chance they deserve to have a bright future. We must continue to work to equitably distribute educational resources, eliminate segregation and gross inequities in school funding, and eliminate discriminatory education policies that undermine equal opportunities for all students.