E/CN.4/1995/78/Add.1 page 14 of Black children are not able to attend pre-school because their parents have financial problems, and while 86 per cent of American children from all income groups are educated in the public schools system, the public schools are failing to educate many, especially those from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Among Blacks, the drop-out rate was 17.7 per cent". 20/ According to the Latino Commission on Educational Reform, "Latino students are segregated in schools whose students come from minority and low socio-economic backgrounds. About half of all Latino and African American students attend intensely segregated schools with 90-100 per cent minority enrolment characterized by high levels of poverty." 21/ 46. Some people assert that covert but real segregation contributes to the development of an underclass of citizens, comprising mainly Blacks, Puerto Ricans and other Hispanics, whose lot is poverty, illness and a lack of education, and who take to crime and drugs in despair. It has been acknowledged that endemic violence has entered American secondary schools to such an extent that some of them have been compelled to install firearms detectors and guards at their gates. 47. A number of persons pointed out that school curricula fail sufficient account of the cultural heritage and ethnic diversity United States and tend to conceal the country’s history and deny of the various non-White communities of which it is composed, to of education emphasizing America’s European heritage. C. to take of the the identity the benefit Housing 48. In regard to housing, one striking feature is apparent from a visit to the large American cities: the contrast between the areas where a majority of Whites live and those lived in by ethnic minorities, and particularly those where African Americans are in the majority. In the White areas, the houses are in a good state of repair, the highways and public infrastructure are well maintained and the household garbage is collected regularly - quite the opposite of what may be seen in those districts where ethnic minorities predominate. There is a de facto segregation which has been shown by certain studies: "According to one analysis of the 1990 Census data, the majority of the nation’s 30 million African Americans were segregated in 1991 as they were at the height of the civil rights movement in the 1960s. In particular, the survey of 219 major metropolitan areas found that African Americans were highly segregated in 31 - or two thirds - of the 47 metropolitan areas where they make up at least 20 per cent of residents, including Detroit, Michigan, Chicago, Illinois, Miami, Florida and Birmingham, Alabama." 22/ 49. The quality of the housing occupied by persons from ethnic minorities is frequently below national standards. For example, many cases of lead contamination have been found in districts where so-called coloured people live, because of the poor state of the waterpipes: "4 million housing units have lead contamination which is affecting 2 million school-aged children". 23/ It should also be pointed out that federal housing