Hey dude, I know this. Apart from some rare examples, whenever a black family makes it out of the hood and moves to the primarily white suburbs, guess what? You see a transformation take place. They see, eventually that all those stereotypes about distrust of whites is mostly a myth. They then begin to integrate. The effect is mutually rewarding to both cultures in-that, whites begin to trust and even become friends with neighbors that they wouldn't otherwise normally associate with, and the black family begins to realize that not all whites hate them, in fact, they're mostly indifferent and like most American's, they judge not based on your color, but on your character. The reason blacks from the hood keeps perpetuating the myths is that blacks busing in to white neighborhoods to work at McDonald's or wherever, are met at the checkout terminal with skeptical white customers, and there is this uneasy truce, but both sides know each other is distrustful of the other, and nothing in the transaction makes any of it go away. In short, these brief encounters don't last long enough to have any affect on the cultural divide, and the attitudes continue. Whites bitch about the service from the black kid with the attitude, their clothing choices, they're demeanor, and blacks bitch about the fussy white folks with their attitude and demeanor. Sound familiar?
The key to all of this is assimilation through integration, but politicians are all too comfortable keeping both sides skeptical of each other, as it benefits both constituencies politically, but not, in the end, as we see now, materially. All one needs to do is look at Canada where the black populations are about the same as in the US, however, unlike the US, Canada, even in the larger cities like T.O. do not have predominately black neighborhoods. Assimilation, for the most part has taken place, and neither culture has had time to foster stereotypes and distrust of the other because there typically isn't any large enough groups of any one particular demographic to help kindle that inevitable outcome.
That's my take on it anyway. Plus, we all know black kids can learn just fine, we've proven that time and again. So you're right, it's more than just education. It's cultural!
Tim-