Police escorting a school bus in Boston's Hyde Park neighborhood in October 1979. (City of Boston archives)

FIFTY YEARS AGO on September 12, 1974, yellow school buses rolled up Dorchester Heights to South Boston High School. It was the first day of court-ordered desegregation of public schools in Boston. What ensued was ugly, violent, and traumatic. 

Busing was Boston’s Selma or Little Rock — an event which stained our city’s reputation around the world and a turning point that signaled a long-overdue series of changes that have radically reshaped Boston, for the better. From those dark days of desegregation, when the school buses were hit with bricks and when the Black children on them were greeted with angry jeers and racial slurs from a threatening mob on the schoolhouse steps, 50 years later Boston has emerged as a different place and a different city – more tolerant, more diverse and more embracing of change. 

I was Mayor Kevin White’s chief of staff back then and accompanied some of those school buses. I now live in South Boston. So, I’ve had a front-row seat as Boston has evolved and lifted itself from the stain of racism and violence into a more welcoming, tolerant and diverse era.  

Boston has come far and made so much progress that it’s hard to remember how ugly things were just 50 years ago. That’s one of the reasons why a group of 40 students, teachers, and community activists who were directly involved in busing 50 years ago have created the Boston Desegregation and Busing Initiative and organized a series of events to remember and to reflect on some of the lessons learned. All our events are free and open to the public.

We should never forget how painful school desegregation was for students, parents, teachers, and communities. For many, these precious years became a lost decade of growth and learning, undermining the very purpose of education.

Desegregation was required because, regrettably, elected members of the Boston School Committee disobeyed the law and engaged in illegal racial discrimination. Two individuals in particular, Ruth Batson and Ellen Jackson, fought heroically for educational reforms and led a movement that finally brought the system to account for its actions and inactions.

While the scars of busing are still visible, so is the progress in our city – the peaceful desegregation of Boston’s public housing; more teachers and administrators in our public schools who reflect the students they serve; a new generation of public leadership, including an Asian American woman mayor, a Haitian American City Council woman president, and an African American female member of Congress. We have a model community policing program and one of the lowest crime rates in the nation. And plans are underway to transform Roxbury’s Nubian Square into Boston’s Black Wall Street. Today, Boston is one of the most innovative and successful economies in the world.

We still have much to accomplish. Public schools still fail too many of our students. Three out of four children in Boston Public Schools are not ready to learn when they enter the 4th grade. 

Glaring racial and economic inequalities still persist. For instance, life expectancy rates between two neighborhoods, Grove Hall and Back Bay, separated by barely two miles, remain a shocking 23 years – 92 years versus 69 years. The high cost of housing and rents, and the chronic problems of our public transportation system threaten to jeopardize our progress.

Fifty years after those school buses rolled and desegregation began in Boston, we can all learn from this crucible of conflict by acknowledging how far we’ve come and accepting how much more is left to do.

Ira Jackson was chief of staff to Boston Mayor Kevin White during phase 1 of busing. He is a cofounder of the Civic Action Project and a research fellow at the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School.