In recent years, the number of public schools segregating their students by sex has ballooned, despite mounting evidence that single-sex programs don’t improve academic performance and instead perpetuate sex stereotypes. But things are changing. This week, yet another school district — this time in Tallapoosa County, Alabama — agreed to stop segregating its 350 middle school students by sex. The development in Alabama follows a string of similar turnarounds by school districts in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Louisiana.
During a visit to Alabama last week, many families told me that they now live in constant fear and are scared to go to work, school or the grocery store.
Alabama segregates all prisoners with HIV, and houses them separately from all other prisoners – it’s an HIV ghetto. As soon as you walk into Limestone Correctional Facility, the prison where Alabama houses all male prisoners with HIV, you know who has the virus: they are forced to wear a white armband day and night.
Alabama’s outrageous attempt to deny some immigrant children their right to education is among the provisions that was rejected Monday by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. The Atlanta-based court also blocked other harmful parts of Alabama and Georgia’s anti-immigrant laws, including those that attempted to criminalize everyday actions with undocumented immigrants.
But the court left room for narrow implementation of certain ‘show me your papers’ provisions, which the ACLU and a civil rights coalition will continue to fight against.
Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley late Friday signed a measure that makes small changes to the state’s anti-immigrant law. The move came a day after he signaled he might veto the measure because he found two key parts unacceptable, including a "scarlet letter" provision that would have branded many law-abiding immigrants as criminals.
Despite his reservations, Bentley said he signed the measure to “remove the distraction of immigration” from a special session of the Legislature he called this week, and allow what he called “progress made in the legislation to move forward.”
By Laura W. Murphy, Director, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 5:19pm
Today we let federal lawmakers know that Arizona’s racial profiling law, S.B. 1070, is about much more than just the state of Arizona and its immigrants. It’s about how we see ourselves as a nation.
