Civil rights groups call for school funding

A national coalition of civil rights groups outlined a plan Monday calling for new investments in public schools and making sure that poor neighborhoods and school districts receive their share of education dollars.

The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights said its 12-point initiative would improve schools, promote diversity and attack poverty. The coalition also said its plan would fulfill the promise of the U.S. Supreme Court’s historic Brown v. Board of Education decision, which declared school segregation unconstitutional.

The coalition unveiled its package on the 50th anniversary of the Brown decision.

The coalition said state and federal governments needed to spend more money to maintain small class sizes, build new schools, provide up-to-date technology to existing schools and help poor school districts recruit and retrain teachers.

But the coalition also wants to attack discrimination in housing and lending, build wealth in minority communities and encourage affluent school districts to enroll children from poor areas.

Sebelius recommits to Brown principles

Gov. Kathleen Sebelius signed a proclamation Monday declaring that because the promise of the Brown v. Board of Education decision had yet to be realized, “We recommit ourselves to the principles of an equal education and opportunity for all.”

In a prepared text of her remarks for the proclamation ceremony, Sebelius noted that the Kansas Territory was a key battleground over slavery before the Civil War and that Kansas entered the Union as a free state.

“But just as we celebrate how far we have come, we must acknowledge how far we still have to go,” Sebelius said. “Although black and white Americans live, work, and learn together now, there is still injustice in America.”

The proclamation honored the nation’s civil rights leaders and the plaintiffs and attorneys whose achievement in the Brown case began with the filing of a federal lawsuit in Topeka in 1951.

Second school involved in case now abandoned

The all-white Topeka school that Linda Brown wanted to attend as a child now sits empty, several of its windows boarded up.

In the fall of 1950, school officials rejected the attempts of Brown’s father, Oliver, the lead plaintiff in the Brown v. Board of Education case, to enroll her at Sumner School.

Sumner, named for an abolitionist senator from Massachusetts, was only five blocks from the Browns’ home. The all-black Monroe School was 21 blocks from their home.

While throngs gathered Monday at the former Monroe School to celebrate the grand opening of a civil rights museum there, Sumner School was largely overlooked. The school has not contained students since the mid-1990s.

For a time, the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library used the former school for storage while the library was under construction. The city of Topeka now owns Sumner, which is a National Landmark but hasn’t been purchased by the National Park Service.

Capital-Journal prints extra edition Monday

The Brown anniversary and President Bush’s visit prompted The Topeka Capital-Journal to publish an extra edition Monday afternoon.

“We thought we needed to be getting the news out there as soon as possible, and we didn’t want to wait until morning,” said Executive Editor Will Kennedy. “It’s just a huge day.”

Kennedy said the newspaper published 7,000 copies of the eight-page edition, which began selling about 1:30 p.m., shortly after Bush finished his remarks. The paper’s last extra edition was published on Sept. 12, 2001, the day after the terrorist attacks.