The nation's largest public school system last week fell victim to a collision between two significant contemporary movements: the justifiable, and not necessarily incompatible, yearnings for teacher power and for black power. All but a handful of New York City's 900 schools were twice shut down by strikes as the tightly disciplined United Federation of Teachers confronted a predominantly Negro community in an angry struggle over teacher assignments.
The main issue in the dispute was whether or not a community-run school committee in the Ocean Hill-Brownsville section of Brooklyn had the right to transfer teachers out of its district....
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