As a Black high school student in Newark, Michelle Ametekpor remembers feeling as if her culture wasn’t being celebrated.

Jennifer Garcia, a Latina who attended a majority-white school in Middlesex, didn’t see teachers who reflected her cultural background.

And Jeremiah LaPorte, a senior at an Elizabeth high school, says he wishes he would see more diversity among students in school leadership positions.

The three students shared their experiences of going to public schools in the state at a virtual town hall on Friday. They remember “feeling lost” and “having to fight” to make their voices heard.

The New Jersey Coalition of Educational Equity organized the discussion in anticipation of a much-awaited ruling on a school segregation lawsuit that could have historic consequences for the state’s public schools. The lawsuit, filed in 2018, says the state is responsible for addressing the fact that more than half of Black and Hispanic or Latino students attend schools that are predominantly non-white.

“Our goals are to create a more safe and inclusive and supportive environment where all students can thrive and properly prepare for their future,” Val Posso, a youth organizer for the Latino Action Network Foundation, one of the organizations leading the lawsuit, said during the town hall.

New Jersey, one of the most diverse public school systems in the country, is also the sixth most segregated state for Black students and seventh for Latino students, according to a 2017 UCLA Civil Rights Project study that’s cited in the lawsuit.

Read the full article about school segregation by Jessie Gomez at Chalkbeat.