The Enduring Legacy of Rodriguez: Creating New Pathways to Equal Educational Opportunity

In this ambitious volume, leading legal and educational scholars examine San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez (1973), the landmark US Supreme Court decision that held that the Constitution does not guarantee equality of educational opportunity. Charles J. Ogletree, Jr., and Kimberly Jenkins Robinson have brought together a host of experts in their field to examine the road that led up to the Rodriguez decision, assess the successes and failures of the reforms that followed in its wake, and lay out an array of creative strategies for addressing the ongoing inequality of resources and socioeconomic segregation that perpetuate the inequity of opportunity in education.

Successive waves of school reform efforts have failed to counteract the pernicious effects of inequality on student learning and achievement. The widely perceived exhaustion of these conventional approaches has led to a renewed interest in the Rodriguez decision and its impact on efforts to improve educational opportunity and outcomes for all students. A timely volume, The Enduring Legacy of Rodriguez makes a comprehensive statement that will inform research and reform for the next generation of scholars, educators, lawyers, and policy makers.

Charles J. Ogletree, Jr., the Harvard Law School Jesse Climenko Professor of Law and founding and executive director of the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice, is a prominent legal theorist who has made an international reputation by taking a hard look at complex issues of law and by working to secure the rights guaranteed by the Constitution for everyone equally under the law. Ogletree opened the offices of the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice (http://www.charleshamiltonhouston.org) in September 2005 as a tribute to the legendary lawyer, mentor, and teacher of such great civil rights lawyers as Thurgood Marshall and Oliver Hill. The Institute has engaged in a wide range of important educational, legal, and policy issues over the last ten years.

Ogletree is the author of several important books on race and justice, with his most recent publication (coedited with Austin Sarat) being Life Without Parole: America’s New Death Penalty? (New York University Press, 2012). His other publications include The Presumption of Guilt: The Arrest of Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Race, Class, and Crime in America (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), The Road to Abolition: The Future of Capital Punishment in the United States (coedited with Austin Sarat, New York University Press, 2009), and his historical memoir All Deliberate Speed: Reflections on the First Half-Century of Brown v. Board of Education (W. W. Norton, 2004).

He has received numerous awards. In 2009 he was awarded the prestigious American Bar Association Spirit of Excellence Award in recognition of his many contributions to the legal profession, and in 2008 the National Law Journal named Ogletree one of the 50 Most Influential Minority Lawyers in America. In 2006 he also received the first Rosa Parks Civil Rights Award, given by the City of Boston; the Hugo A. Bedau Award given by the Massachusetts Anti-Death Penalty Coalition; and Morehouse College’s Gandhi, King, Ikeda Community Builders Prize. He also received honorary degrees from Morehouse College in 2011 and from Amherst College in 2002.

Kimberly Jenkins Robinson is a professor at the University of Richmond School of Law and a researcher at the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute at Harvard Law School. A national expert on the federal role in education, civil rights, and educational equity, she has published her work in a variety of scholarly journals and books, including the Chicago Law Review, North Carolina Law Review, Wake Forest Law Review, Washington University Law Review, and William & Mary Law Review. Robinson joined the University of Richmond School of Law faculty in 2010, and she currently teaches education law and policy, legislation and regulation, pretrial drafting, and a seminar on law and educational equity. She previously served on the faculty at Emory University School of Law from 2004 to 2010. Prior to becoming a law professor, she served at the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of General Counsel for five years, where she helped draft federal policy regarding race, national origin, sex, and disability discrimination. Her professional experience also includes clerking for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and representing school districts in funding and race discrimination cases while at Hogan & Hartson LLP (now Hogan Lovells). Robinson graduated with honors in 1996 from Harvard Law School, where she served as an articles editor for the Harvard Law Review.