Town hall commemorates 50 years of school desegregation, discusses work to be done

When Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools were first desegregated in 1966, Keith Edwards’ dream to one day be a member of the Lincoln High School band was lost.

On her first day at the newly integrated Chapel Hill Junior High School, she didn’t want to leave the car.

At school, the longtime Chapel Hill resident said she was spit on, tripped and called names.

“We black kids — we were not bullied — we were terrorized,” she said.

A forum at Northside Elementary School Saturday commemorated 50 years of desegregation in Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools, but it acknowledged that more work still needs to be done.

The forum was organized by the Lincoln High-Orange County Training School Alumni Association.

When Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools were desegregated in 1966, students from the all-black Lincoln High School were required to attend what is now Chapel Hill High School. Desegregation was a step toward inclusion, but it carried hardships of change and uprooted students and teachers from a comfortable environment — a common theme discussed at the forum.

Carolyn Daniels, panel member and one of the first students to graduate from the newly desegregated Chapel Hill High School in 1967, said she felt a deep sense of loss when Lincoln High closed.

“During my senior year, the saying ‘separate but equal’ comes to mind, which is one of the biggest lies I’ve ever heard,” she said.

Event coordinator Danita Mason-Hogans said the issue of desegregation in Chapel Hill-Carrboro has never truly been resolved, but a community effort, like the forum, will help everyone to better understand one another.

“Some of the things that are going on now have residual effects in the desegregation of the schools,” said Mason-Hogans, who graduated from the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools system in 1985.

She said when she was going through school, she felt like her teachers had negative feelings and lower expectations for her than they had for white students.

James Barrett, chairperson of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Board of Education, said strides have been made for integration, but there is still more work to be done. He said the school board has been working on an equity plan to help close some racial inconsistencies in schools.

“It’s a little disheartening to think about how things haven’t changed in 50 years that much,” Barrett said. “There are still situations where you can look in a window of a room and know by the color of the students in there what the level of the class is.”

David Mason Jr., president of the Lincoln High-Orange County Training School Alumni Association and Mason-Hogans’ father, said the biggest problem in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro schools is the achievement gap, followed by punishment disparities. He said it’s good to know the school board is proactive in establishing greater equity.

“I happen to believe that one of the biggest problems we have today is a lack of empathy, so if you can have people express their ideas and feelings, and other people identify with them, I think that we can make some changes,” Mason said.

city@dailytarheel.com