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.What Did You Learn in School Today?The schools, like all of society s institutions, are not immune tolarger social and historical forces.School desegregation was and is, ofcourse, only one of these; any analytic assessment of problems in the schoolswould identify many potential culprits.During the time that AC s childrenwere in the public schools, the schools were also experiencing other revo-lutions, such as the increasing importance of standardized testing, increas-ing class sizes, changing gender roles and expectations, and no doubt amyriad of new pedagogical practices (which seem always in flux).At thesame time, in economic periods good or bad, rural schools always struggle;they must always make do with less, even as the expectations being set forthem by outside groups are increased.10But the political and interpersonal ramifications to school desegregationwere of paramount significance for all of AC s children.Their experienceswith the local schools demonstrate the kinds of challenges that the schoolspresent, especially in rural school districts where there is usually limited school choice. Instead, the students must make do with what is presentedto them.This brings to mind the folk song What Did You Learn in SchoolToday? 11 with its memorable lines like I learned that Washington nevertold a lie, I learned that soldiers seldom die, I learned our governmentmust be strong, it s always right and never wrong. As this song makes clear,there is a mythology to much that we are told and subsequently accept astrue.The schools are major purveyors of these tales, most often wantingto share knowledge widely assumed to be true even if (as in the song) muchof it is folklore or myth or would be hard-pressed to withstand careful scru-tiny and rigorous assessment.The one certainty is that in Colonial County,What Did You Learn in School Today? 99the schools have never been particularly good and, for African Americans,the days prior to school desegregation may have provided better schoolingthan the ones since.As everyone I spoke with confirmed, even if not in the most statistical,analytical way, all social arrangements have costs and benefits; in the caseof the schools, the old norms were displaced by desegregation, equal op-portunity programs of all kinds, and evolving gender roles and relationsamong other social forces.But, in the end, how much do we know aboutthe new norms? My sense is: not much, and this would apply equally to vir-tually all southern rural school districts that did and still do have large blackpopulations.Those were the places where segregation academies (by what-ever name) were most likely to arise on the heels of federal court orders todesegregate.Many of those schools failed, but many did not and are still inbusiness; they are a reminder of a form of de facto segregation that stillexists, paralleling much of the social life not only in rural counties but inhighly segregated urban places as well.100 Rooted in PlaceFiveIn the Lord s HouseIf we had a continuum for racial segregation within American in-stitutions, schools would be at one end, as the most racially desegregated;churches would be at the other end, as the most racially segregated.Noaffirmative action program affects churches as it might school or work orthe right to buy a house without suffering racial discrimination.There isno legislated equal opportunity imperative when it comes to church at-tendance.If any place reflects freedom of choice albeit buttressed by resi-dential patterns it is the church.And no matter when you look at who isthere (that is, whenever church meetings are held), one thing will be para-mount: racially, the people will all (or nearly all) look alike.This is true re-gardless of whether the church is in the city, the suburbs, or a small town.In rural communities, religion in general and local churches in particu-lar take on greater significance than in most urban and suburban areas.Inrural areas, religion is often easily infused into everyday life and, becausethe local population is less heterogeneous than in urban areas, relativelygreater proportions of local people have the same religious beliefs andchurch affiliation.Too, the church almost always refers to a local place; itis far less likely to be thought of in some larger denominational way.As withnearly all things rural, there is a sense of ownership profound and intense;it is ours (the local population s), with the pride of ownership and degreeof caring this brings.Then, there is a sense of community around the church100In the Lord s House 101in part because a church serves as a multipurpose place for sacred and secu-lar functions.Further, in rural areas the church is more likely to be accom-panied by a born-again fervor.Such religiosity is especially true in the ruralSouth.Sociologist John Shelton Reed, citing Flannery O Connor, notes thatthe South is Christ-haunted and that, to understand the region, one mustunderstand the role that religion plays in southern life.1Scholars have long noted the importance of the church for African Ameri-cans and African American communities.Sociologist Andrew Billingsley hasstated, Fully 70 percent of black adults belong to just one [organization],namely the black church. 2 In their book on the black church in America,C.Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H
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