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- NATION, Page 38American NotesCIVIL RIGHTS Storm Over The Schools
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- Twenty-five years ago, in Selma, Ala., club-wielding police
- attacked civil rights marchers on the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Now
- the city of 27,000 is again experiencing racial turmoil. Last
- week 150 black high school students boycotted classes to protest
- the school board's failure to renew the contract of black
- Superintendent Norward Roussell. Governor Guy Hunt ordered
- National Guardsmen to protect students who went to school
- despite the boycott.
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- In three years at the helm of the 70% black school system,
- Roussell alienated whites by, among other things, revising the
- "tracking" system that had long channeled black students into
- lower-level courses. After the board's six white members voted
- to get rid of Roussell last December, five black board members
- quit in protest. Last week's boycott ended after five days, when
- Roussell appealed to the students to return to class. But
- biracial talks to determine his future broke down with no
- resolution of the impasse.
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