Most of Mecklenburg County's neighborhoods are either largely white or minority. Even with integration, about 30 percent of Charlotte schools today could be considered racially imbalanced. Some parents say resegregation is a trade worth making to return to neighborhood schools. A majority of Charlotte-Mecklenburg school board members disagree. Educators and long-time Charlotteans are fighting to protect the community's commitment to integration.
Tradition is at stake.
Here in the 1970s, Charlotte banded together after initial unrest to become the first city in the country to successfully integrate through busing. In 1992, though a more conservative U.S. Supreme Court had given new latitude to end busing plans, the school board unanimously reaffirmed its commitment to integration. Here in 1997, Kate Jenkins and Angela Wood Fritz, both teachers at Myers Park High, still talk about the success of integration. They talk about it even though, as a white student in the early 1970s, Jenkins often missed class because racial fighting closed schools. As a black student, Fritz was spat at in the newly integrated West Mecklenburg High.