Phyllis P. McClure, a longtime advocate for disadvantaged and minority students, died May 17 in Washington. She was 72 and had pancreatic cancer. Ms. McClure served in the civil rights office of the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare and worked for the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights during the 1960s. She joined the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, working there from 1969 to 1994, and was a co-author of the 1969 report “Title I of ESEA: Is It Helping Poor Children?,” which examined the impact of the then-4-year-old Elementary and Secondary Education Act on disadvantaged children in high-poverty schools. Ms. McClure also served on the U.S. Office of Education’s Title I Task Force from 1969 to 1970.
A version of this article appeared in the June 09, 2010 edition of Education Week as Rights Advocate Phyllis McClure Dies