Friday marked the 70th anniversary of the 1954 Supreme Court ruling that barred the “Separate but equal” policy in schools throughout America.

Now, 70 years later, there is still debate on whether or not the Brown v. Board of Education ruling was effective and resulted in the desired impact that made school segregation illegal.

Hold it. Let me backup: As you can see from my photo here, I am not Black. Still, I’m going to touch on some racial issues. And, while I cannot pretend to relate to the same issues facing the Black populations of the 1950s, I was the product of desegregation/integration in an urban public school system that made some attempt to follow the Brown ruling.

My elementary school days (K-6) were spent at a community school within walking distance. Junior high school (grades 7-9) took me an hour’s school bus ride across town to an intercity school in a predominantly Black neighborhood.

Then, during the high school years, I was back at my local school, at which the kids from the Black neighborhood were bused into our suburban community. So, that’s my experience with desegregation and in that light I felt that it would be appropriate that in the midst of the university and high school graduation season, we acknowledge the anniversary of the Brown decision.

Many news reports on Friday contained a similar question: Have Americans truly ended segregation in fact, not just in law? Having covered the first high school graduation of the school year on Friday, I can assure you that, in fact — or at least in appearance — PSRC Early College students are about as diverse as even Thurgood Marshall would agree that “separate but equal” has no place in our schools.

Again, to qualify that statement, I am seeing a graduation through the eyes of a middle-age white man. Still, as I pointed my camera toward student’s filing across the RCC auditorium stage I captured pictures of a wide spectrum of the population at RCC. Some of those images are on Page 1A today.

Regardless of race or cultural backgrounds, all graduates wore Early College blue robes as they triumphantly marched across the stage, shaking hands of school officials, teachers and mentors. Incidentally, some of the first hands that graduates had the honor of shaking were those of color, including PSRC Superintendent Freddie Williamson, and RCC President Melissa Singler, whose own journey to RCC was not unlike many of the students under her tutelage.

Like those under their charge, Williamson, Singular and many, many others worked together to participate in the journeys of those receiving high school diplomas on Friday — most of whom also earned an associate degree from Robeson Community College.

Thurgood Marshall, the NAACP attorney and later Supreme Court Justice, was the driving force behind Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka 70 years ago and he was the driving force behind the end of school segregation. Marshall said once, “A child born to a Black mother in a state like Mississippi…has exactly the same rights as a white baby born to the wealthiest person in the United States. It’s not true, but I challenge anyone to say it is not a goal worth working for.”

From all indications, those walking across the stage Friday at RCC may not have known it, but they were fulfilling the idea behind Marshall’s “worth working for” statement. And whether they knew it or not — or even cared — the concepts of segregation of integration were at play.

Those who can remember when Thurgood Marshall visited Robeson County may also remember his speech delivered Oct. 15, 1954, at the South Lumberton First Baptist Church.

“The only effective way to accomplish desegregation is to do it at once and firmly,” Marshall said.

According to The Robesonian’s coverage of that speech, Marshall “stressed the fact that the Negro must work continuously as an individual and in groups to advance the ten-year plan to complete desegregation laid out by the NAACP. He urged members to go out and work on the individual and at the local level.”

Today, here in “rural” Lumberton, we don’t give much thought to segregation because our schools are filled with children from local communities, so the cultural diversity is a reflection of that found in the areas surrounding our local schools, which may or may not accomplish the goals of Marshall’s diversity model.

Certainly, though, we do not have public schools for “whites only.” Generally, our school districts are designed by colorblind local legislators, who’s only interest is that all our children have access to a high quality education.

So, as a member of the media, I’ll ask again, “Have we achieved Marshall’s vision of desegregation? Have Americans truly ended segregation in fact, not just in law?”