Frederick Douglass High School In The Era Of Desegregation, 1954-2006: A Historical Analysis

Abstract

The issue of school desegregation in America has received attention from scholars who have examined the phenomenon within the context of Civil Rights activism during which under the auspices of the NAACP, Thurgood Marshall successfully argued against practices of racial segregation in schools. Widely known accounts of school integration, such as the Little Rock Nine event in 1957, have been highlighted when dissecting the challenges African American students faced after the 1954 Brown v. The Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas decision to end school segregation. This thesis examines the effects of school desegregation on Frederick Douglass High School (FDHS) in Baltimore City. Frederick Douglass High School, the first all-Black high school in Baltimore City, developed out of the need to educate the city's youth beyond the primary grades, and help to shape and produce black professionals. In the decades following school desegregation, significant changes in the demographics of the neighborhoods in which many of the high school's students lived and the attendant social ills, negatively affected the culture and attitude of the students of the school. Therefore, during desegregation, the school progressively came to be comprised of a population of students who dealt with communal dysfunctions that posed significant barriers to the school in terms of discipline, attendance and the educational development of its students.