Busing to Desegregate Schools back in the headlines. Perspectives from Yonkers NY
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Two different women. Two different perspectives.
“My mom always told me take advantage of anything they give you,anything they offer you.” La Ronda Jefferson — Graduate of Yonkers Public Schools
“Kids from over this side were happy to be going over to that side.” La Ronda Jefferson — Graduate of Yonkers Public Schools
“I was in like everything. Like I was in computer program. I was in math program, I was in twirling, I was in cheerleading, I was in yearbook.” La Ronda Jefferson — Graduate of Yonkers Public Schools
”It was really eye opening for us to see that other side of Yonkers. This was my home town, but I had really never been in those neighborhoods.” — Lauren Rufo Stanco
Busing as a means of *desegregating* schools has once again become part of the public discourse with former Vice President Joe Biden coming under attack at the Democratic Debates, mostly from another candidate, Senator Kamala Harris of California. Harris and all the other Democrats in the field are hoping to gain traction, and defeat Biden, who every poll has shown has the best shot at defeating the incumbent President, Donald Trump.
Lauren Rufo Stanco still has her bus pass from back then. For her, the big change came in 1986 when she was bused to Junior High School outside her neighborhood. She went from Yonkers East Side, in her close-knit community of mostly Italian, Irish and Jewish families to a racially mixed John Burroughs Junior High School.
