Kozol questioned why they were still using this type of book in a predominately African American school. (This was a book that was given to Mr. Kozol from the reading teacher, which she said she used that book for many years, herself).
Kozol made a god point about the fact that things would not change even if they took away the books; "the teachers who believe in those books are still teaching and until they stop teaching, or stop believing, the assumptions will live on and the dignity of the children will decay". (pg.72) I agree with him 100%. As long as the teachers are telling them that they are animals and the books are describing them as animals, then how do you expect them to act? .
During that time (the 1960's) society would not have been any help to the education problem. At that time racism was still pretty strong. White people felt that black people should be happy to be getting any type of education at all. For black people their only hope to change things would be to try on their own. But that would have been somewhat impossible since the parents were barely educated themselves, and the resources that they had were limited because they were not economically stable.
It was made clear by one of the Boston school Committee members, Joseph Lee, during his speech in 1965 that "white parents prefer schools predominately white for their children". (pg.214) he also talked about the Open Enrollment Policy, which mostly only the white children have taken advantage of. But the Open Enrollment Policy is of no help to the black children because how would they be able to get to other schools. The parents barely have enough money to clothe and fee their children. Where would they get the extra money for transportation? .
It surprised me to read this and to see things like this going on in 1965, when in 1954 Linda Brown and her father won their case against the Board of Education, for the integration of schools.