Fifty years after the landmark Brown v. Board of Education ruling that ordered schools to be desegregated, more than half of the campuses in Los Angeles Unified are still racially divided.

But school integration, which the courts tried but ultimately failed to establish through an unpopular forced busing program from 1978 to 1981, is no longer the issue that keeps Los Angeles school officials up at night.

The issue that does occupy their minds is the alarming failure rates among Latino and African-American students, who now compose 85 percent of the school district's nearly 750,000 students.

"It's very difficult now to talk about integration when you have a minority school district," LAUSD Board President Jose Huizar said. "Our goal is to improve public education and LAUSD for the children we have now."

Today, LAUSD has nearly 450 schools, with fewer than 30 percent white students -- the district's definition of a racially isolated campus -- and that is double the number in 1978. About 75 percent of students are in "economically disadvantaged" families, and the current achievement gaps between ethnic groups are staggering.

"It's obvious there's more that needs to be done; whether we're on the right track or not, the jury's still out on that," said Fluke Fluker, a teacher at Cleveland High School.

On the 2003 California High School Exit Exam, only 23 percent of African-American students and 27 percent of Latino students passed the math portion, compared with 61 percent of white students.

About 36 percent of Latino students and 43 percent of African-American students dropped out of high school, compared with 19.2 percent of white students, according to a recent report from the California Department of Education.

Los Angeles Unified points to subpar conditions as one reason students are performing poorly. Some 14,000 students still have to be bused out of their neighborhoods because their own schools are overcrowded.

District leaders have discussed expansion of such things as "small learning communities" and "culturally relevant curriculum" as ways to close the achievement gaps. But, with mounting budget problems, some leaders said it's nearly impossible to make the sweeping changes needed to reverse the trends.

Some programs, like a new phonics curriculum for elementary students, are showing promise. And LAUSD is well into a $10 billion construction program that will build 150 new neighborhood schools.

"I think we're making strides," said Bob Aries, head of the San Fernando Valley's Communities in Schools, a nonprofit group that supplements public education programs.

To further improve student performance, class size must be reduced, said John Perez, president of United Teachers Los Angeles. The average LAUSD high school class has more than 40 students.

"It's the proverbial 600-pound gorilla nobody wants to talk about, because everybody knows we don't have the money to do it," Perez said.

Yet, some specialized programs, such as magnet schools, have consistently outperformed others. LAUSD started magnets in 1976 as a voluntary way to integrate students and improve academics. About 53,000 Los Angeles Unified students attend magnets.

"The district, we would have hoped, would have grasped the concept and expanded it," said Theodore Alexander Jr., associate superintendent of integration services for LAUSD. "It's hard for me and it's difficult for me to comprehend that the district wouldn't embrace it and say keep it together, let it grow."

Magnet schools have both racial quotas and subject matter specialties, such as science or performing arts, that are used to draw students.

"People of all ethnicities will come together if you put them in a high-quality educational setting," said Caprice Young, a former LAUSD magnet student and school board member. "The magnets work, and there's a reason they work: They're a school of choice."

But LAUSD resident Patty Patano said quality education must be available for all students -- not just those at magnets.

"It's the idea that there is a level of education that certain students receive that other schools aren't getting," she said. "Busing is just another way of a school district solving its own problems and once again neglecting the need of children."

Patano, who supports neighborhood schools, said LAUSD must cut through the bureaucracy to find ways to improve education for all children. "We are by nature already an extremely diverse city. We're a city with a lot of money. We're a city that used to be known for all kinds of creativity. Why can't that creativity be applied to the school system?"

LAUSD also needs to expand its community outreach efforts to help African-American and other minority parents take a role in their children's educations, said the Rev. Zedar Broadus, head of the San Fernando Valley NAACP.

"Here, you have a community that hasn't been in that environment of realizing that they really do have that power," he said. "There are some groups of minorities who are so used to a system that pushes them down. In a lot of cases, rather than be pushed down, they stay down."

But financial limitations make program expansion a struggle. In the last four years, LAUSD has cut $4 billion from its budget and faces more shortfalls in the future.

Class sizes and student-to-counselor ratios have been increased. Some schools have been forced to cut programs and can barely afford supplies like toilet paper.

While LAUSD knows that certain programs work, like smaller classes and better-trained teachers, it won't be able to afford them without massive overhaul to the funding system, said Perez, head of UTLA.

"There's really no free lunch," he said. "It's really that simple. If you want better schools, you have to pay more taxes."