In this paper the author takes the position that integrated schools are basic to a genuinely integrated society. Similarly, only through equal education can we offer equal opportunity to every citizen. Segregated schools, the author states, are a result of poverty and government sanctioned segregation in other areas. The most obvious of these areas is housing. The most effective way to achieve school integration, given this situation, is through redistricting and busing. The author demonstrates the contradictory nature of arguments against busing for purposes of integration, pointing out that transporting children to school has been a part of American educational tradition for a century. Poverty and race are often confused as issues in school segregation. This paper asserts that it is socioeconomic class, not color, which is the real issue in school segregation. Few parents would object to their children studying with a black child whose parents are doctors. By isolating poor children in inferior schools, however, we are virtually assuring them of remaining in the social cycle of poverty and ignorance. Everyone stands to lose. The author of this paper posits that a segregated society is analogous to an isolated gene pool in which species eventually atrophy or die out. Diversity, on the other hand, stimulates innovation and creativity. Children in integrated schools, as well as having equal educational opportunities, can stimulate each other in the interest of a vital and dynamic society. (GC)