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Commission to Study Public Schools and Colleges for Colored People in North Carolina
Report and Recommendations of the Commission to Study Public Schools and Colleges for Colored People in North Carolina. Authorized by the General Assembly in Resolution No. 28, March 10, 1937, and Appointed by Governor Clyde R. Hoey
Raleigh, N.C.: [State of N.C.], [1937].

Summary

This report, made by the Commission to Study Public Schools and Colleges for Colored People, emphasizes deficiencies in North Carolina's African American elementary schools, high schools, and colleges and points to disparities between those institutions and their white counterparts. The report compares student achievement, number of schools, school size, vocational education, and teacher salaries and training. The commission also analyzes county statistics, including student enrollment, student-teacher ratio and the benefits of the Jeanes Teachers, a group of educators supported by a philanthropic fund designed to improve black education throughout the South. The Commission's recommendations focus on legislative appropriations to decrease the gap between white and black students, but also include other suggestions, such as closing smaller rural schools to consolidate resources. The report also outlines how higher education for blacks was funded in other southern states and suggests the formation of a committee—composed of State Board of Education, State Department of Public Instruction, and State School Commission members—to explore the issue further. This group, appointed by the governor, would continue to study schools and make recommendations for improvements in African American schools.

Works Consulted: Jones, Lance G.E., The Jeanes Teacher in the United States 1908-1933: An Account of Twenty-Five Years Experiment in the Supervision of Negro Rural Schools, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1937.

Monique Prince

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