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Toledo Public Schools, U.S. Education Department Reach
Agreement to Address Issues of African American Student
Access to Resources
Special
to The Truth
The U.S. Department of Education’s
Office for Civil Rights and
Toledo Public Schools announced last week that the district
has entered into a resolution agreement to ensure compliance
with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in providing
equitable resources to African-American students.
The agreement, reached before OCR had completed its investigation,
identifies concerns about access to experienced teachers,
teachers with master’s degrees, library access for K-8
students, and distance learning classes for high school
students.
“Toledo Public Schools’ commitment through this resolution
agreement, together with steps the district had begun during
the course of our review, spotlight their important pledge
to equity,” said Catherine Lhamon, assistant secretary for
civil rights. “Superintendent Romules Durant’s efforts to
examine and address racially equitable access to Toledo’s
resources is critical to all the district’s students’
academic and long-term success.”
She added, “We applaud and are grateful for his and his board’s
leadership toward ensuring that all students receive the
opportunity our nation’s civil rights laws promise to them.
And we look forward to working with the district to ensure
that all terms of this agreement are fully and effectively
implemented.”
The agreement acknowledges the district’s on-going efforts to
ensure equitable resources and provides opportunities to
further enhance the focus on giving all students’ equitable
access to district resources and supporting student
success.
OCR’s compliance review, begun in 2010, indicated that the district
increased facility equity through a building plan started in
2005 which rebuilt or renovated nearly every district
school, developed programs to recruit and retain strong
building leadership across all district schools, offered
substantially equal access to strong teachers at least in
the measures of teacher certification and highly qualified
status, and made efforts to provide the same textbooks to
students at all of its schools.
However, OCR’s review also uncovered a number of potential Title VI
compliance concerns regarding equitable access to resources
for African-American students, including experienced
teachers, teachers with master’s degrees, library access for
K-8 students and distance learning classes for high school
students.
The terms of the resolution agreement address the office’s concerns
identified during its investigation. The agreement provides
that the district will:
• Disseminate and post a non-discrimination notice which informs
all members of the school community of their rights and the
district’s responsibilities under Title VI, and the
procedure by which students, parents and employees may
report concerns.
• Obtain OCR approval of revised policies and practices if its
program assessments reveal the district’s initiatives fail
to ensure that equally effective and qualified teachers are
equitably distributed to all district schools.
• Obtain OCR approval of revised policies and practices if its
program assessments reveal the district’s initiatives fail
to continue to ensure that equally effective and qualified
building leaders are equitably distributed to all district
schools.
• Ensure that all students at the district’s K-8 schools can access
their schools’ libraries with the same frequency and check
out the same number of books.
• Deliver “live” instruction of distance learning courses,
including Advanced Placement and other higher-level courses,
across its high schools in a racially equitable manner;
ensuring Advance Placement and other higher-level college
preparatory courses are taught from the district’s racially
identifiable African American high schools providing
students the opportunity to engage in-person with course
instructors.
• Conduct outreach activities for students and parents to
better assess, provide, and monitor its distribution and
allocation of resources.
A copy of the OCR letter to the Toledo Public Schools and a copy of
the agreement can be found online.
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination
on the basis of race, color or national origin in all
programs or activities that receive federal financial
assistance.
OCR’s mission is to ensure equal access to education and promote
educational excellence throughout the nation through the
vigorous enforcement of civil rights. OCR is responsible
for enforcing federal civil rights laws that prohibit
discrimination by educational institutions on the basis of
disability, race, color, national origin, sex, and age, as
well as the Boy Scouts of America Equal Access Act of 2001.
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