Racial inequity among all minorities has been roaming around in schools for decades now; affecting students academic success. Our nation has transformed into a nation that profoundly accepts the separation and inequality in schools. Segregation is being accepted by our nation and individuals act like nothing can be done about it. People expect for our nation to provide an equal outcome for students who leave their homes severely deprived by family members and community poverty. However; these students arrive at a school only to find inexperienced teachers and an ample amount of segregation experiences. Racial inequality plagues our country’s educational system; creating traumatic problems within the school setting, and therefore we should find solutions to these devastating problems. This paper will present both the problem and solution that two writers -Beverly Daniel Tatum and James W. Loewen- will discuss on the ‘Racial Inequality in Schools’ subject. Assuredly, students; particularly, colored-skinned students, have been facing racial inequality within their academic success. In the reading, “Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?”, author Beverly Daniel Tatum states, “Academic success is more often associated with being White. During the encounter phase of racial identity development, when the search for identity leads toward cultural stereotypes and away from anything that might be associated with Whiteness, academic performance often declines.”(Tatum 366) In other words, during the encounter phase of racial identity development, students who are leaning towards becoming cultural stereotypes are not to be accepted in an academic performance because they are most likely to be declined; however, students who are particularly white, have a high chance of succeeding in their process. Author, James W. Loewen, in “From Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong” states that “Errors in history textbooks often go uncorrected, partly because the history profession does not bother to review textbooks.” (Loewen 388) Here, the author indicates that history textbooks are carrying an ample amount of errors; in which professionals do not bother on reviewing and fixing. People rely on history textbooks and sometimes the errors that are presented in these textbooks imply a wrong image of people, which brings hatred upon the people that are described in the textbooks. For example, “Our Virginia: Past and Present,” the controversial history textbook claimed that “thousands of Southern blacks fought in the confederate rank, including two black battalions under the command of stonewall Jackson.” This error was revised because people were becoming very skeptical about it and started to notice the errors that were within the readings. The publisher then had made a more updated version of the book but has been proven by the “Commonwealth Department of Education” that even the updated book still had errors. According to historian, Christopher Hamner, “The notion of fighting alongside blacks violated many deeply-held beliefs of white Northerners and Southerners alike. African Americans served in segregated regiments under white officers; many were used for menial tasks rather than fighting, and those that went into combat suffered abuse from their white comrades and were often singled out as targets by their Confederate foes.” Whites most likely blamed the blacks for the disaster of the ranks and probably thought
