poverty

October 1, 2012 - Today marks 50 years since James Meredith became the first black person to enter the University of Mississippi, sparking a riot that some have called "the last battle of the Civil War." Now 80, he has continued to baffle admirers and detractors throughout his life.

September 28, 2012 - Most of this campaign's rhetoric has focused on creating jobs and helping the middle class. But many of the few jobs being created are low-wage jobs, highlighting that job growth alone will not address the plight of hard-working poor families, who make up a fast-growing portion of the electorate.

September 27, 2012 - The Democratic-controlled Wake County School Board fires a superintendent hired by Republicans bent on ending a successful desegregation policy -- but the move may have put the system's funding in political peril.

September 25, 2012 - Still the nation's most desegregated region, the South is undergoing profound changes that are leading to greater racial and economic isolation of public school students.

September 17, 2012 - Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and his administration's school leaders have come perilously close to sounding like one of those Mississippi legislators back in 1985 who dealt with a statewide teachers' strike by giving them a pay raise -- but at the cost of a provision that prevented them from ever striking again.

September 5, 2012 - Separate federal panels struck down two Texas voting provisions. We look at examples of discrimination they found.

August 29, 2012 - A by-the-numbers look at the city's resurrection in the wake of one of the deadliest and most destructive disasters ever to befall the United States.